STACK September 2017 Issue 155

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048 SEPTEMBER 2017
visit MUSIC REVIEWS
Moses Sumney Aromanticism
“Aromanticism is a concept album
about lovelessness as a sonic
dreamscape.” This one of the
most romantic album statements
I’ve ever read. And yet listening
to the album you soon realise that
it’s a prosaic understatement, for
here is an album of heartbreaking
beauty and grand desolation.
Moses Sumney taught himself
to play guitar while studying
creative writing at UCLA, and has
spent years refining his unique
approach to folk, soul and jazz-
inflected compositions, touring
extensively and collaborating with
artists including James Blake
and The Cinematic Orchestra.
On Aromanticism, each song
soars high above, or shakes
to the core. If this is an age
where idealism struggles with
pragmatism and mystery is left in
favour of measurable outcomes,
Aromanticism is the record that
reminds us this wasn’t always so,
and needn’t always be.
(Inertia) SimonWinkler
Nosaj Thing Parallels
Many years ago (in the '00s) the
peace of Los Angeles' music
community was shocked by the
explosion of something scientists
would later call the Beat Scene.
Labels like Brainfeeder and Alpha
Pup (and producers like Flying
Lotus, TOKiMONSTA and Gaslamp
Killer) rocked the faultlines
between hip hop and electronic
music. A young DJ and producer
with a certain calm clarity to his
work emerged, named Nosaj
Thing. His debut Drift was drawn
with stark synth lines and coloured
with otherworldly sounds; if it was
beamed from outer space, second
album Home was a deeper sonar
signal, dense with atmosphere.
This new collection, arguably his
most accomplished, arrives not
from above, below, or within,
but from a new dimension yet to
be properly described. Parallels
merges the past and the present
with a clear intent for the future of
the ever-evolving LA Beat Scene.
(Inertia) SimonWinkler
Ariel Pink
Dedicated To Bobby Jameson
That the story of Bobby
Jameson appeals to Ariel Pink is
no surprise. The near-myth of a
popstar and savant songwriter
who rejects the mainstream
for the radical underground
is the kind of thing Pink’s
music, with its photonegative
skew on six decades of pop,
implies. Dedicated To Bobby
Jameson reiterates just what
the mainstream is missing. As
usual, Pink hits hardest when
he’s most vulnerable (Another
Weekend, Kitchen Witch),
but even when less lyrically
scrutable on the Bugles-nodding
Time To Live, Pink delivers a
maddening kaleidoscope of his
existential angst. Dedicated to
Bobby Jameson sits comfortably
next to his previous three
records as intricate modern
classics.
(Mistletone) Jake Cleland
Sløtface Try Not To Freak Out
Planning on writing an early
2000’s rom-com? Sløtface
have the soundtrack covered,
although the Norwegian outfit’s
blustering debut doesn’t bother
itself with the self-deprecation
or deep personal heartbreak that
often fill other releases in the
genre. Instead, the four-piece
rip through 35 minutes of feisty
punk like a liberating tornado, with
frontwoman Haley Shea using
her piercing enthusiasm to smash
society's patriarchal structures.
On Magazine Shea attacks the
unrealistic body images promoted
in fashion: “Thoughts that aren’t
mine keep running through my
head…Thunder thighs keeps
reaching for the measuring tape."
On Pitted she gives all the socially
awkward couch-dwellers a pep
talk, and the bass riff-heavy Nancy
Drew creates an idol that will save
the band from the music industry’s
Mens' Club. Norway has a word
for an album like this: fantastik.
(Caroline)Tim Lambert
This month our artist-in-residence Cookie took her sketchbook up close to surf pop duo Hockey Dad at
The Zoo, and got a face full of MC Ride of experimental Californian hip hop group Death Grips at Max
Watt's (both in Brissie). Admire Cookie's other live music illustrations on her instagram, @sketchygigs.
COOKIE'S SKETCHY GIGS