Back in April Sonic Masala put on its first show north of the Equator, jamming in Power Lunches in Dalston, London, for what was a spectacular night of noise. Kicked off with the light, sepulchral guitar-looped meditations of TOOMS, things were cranked into a frenzy by one-man disco doomsayer mnttab and white noise nihilists Giant Swan. In there too though was the first set of Yaws (AKA Dom Stephens), who managed to entrance the audience with his set, with the tiny space in pitch black outside of the white static of a flickering television screen, starting off with undulating rhythms and pulses before building to a darkly euphoric tantric release - ear bleeding voodoo disco.
Today we are lucky enough to premiere Yaws' first release, a two-track cassette through English/Italian hybrid label WorkinKlassNoize. The A side, 'Undo U', is a seven minute static crawl through the inert temporality of relationships both organic and synthetic - there is a mewling vocal underneath the scored beats that feels alien yet also mundane. The repetition that Yaws showed was his centrifugal foundation is evident here too, and while not as darkly affecting as 'The Seventh Continent', it's a sordid slice of cyberstatic sluicing around the veins.
Then there is the B-side, 'Candy'. Stephens has stated that these tracks look at the hyper-intense nature of contemporary life, highlighting the role of sex in mainstream culture. Yes, the echoed taps, drips and distant manipulated moans that crawl out the back end of 'Undo U' show shadows of this, but the pent-up grind of 'Candy' is more emblematic of the simultaneous coarse/silken desire of hardbodies. The repetition here is more muted yet more feverish, a heat inherent in the roiling rhythms that quickens the heartbeat and holds the mind in delirious sway. The sexual build up of tension and pulse rate is a dangerously alluring amalgam, one that bottoms out in a drone that swallows you whole.
The cassette will be available June 12. Yaws is playing Thursday week (May 22) at Hackney Picturehouse, alongside Simon Frank and Elephant House - will be killer.
No comments:
Post a Comment