Julia Gjertsen
Shadow Light
I wanted to kick off today’s SOUND BYTES column by revisiting Moderna Records, a Canadian label which continues to meticulously curate its platform in releasing some of the best of contemporary classical music with a crossover to ambient and cinematic sound. If I haven’t covered every single release, then at least I have listened to it all, and I can highly recommend its quality catalogue. This morning, I am spending sharing my time with music by Julia Gjertsen, a Norwegian pianist and composer, returning to the imprint for her third full-length album. On Shadow Light, Gjertsen softly weaves in a tapestry of analogue ambient pads with gentle strings and guitar strums courtesy of Robert M. Thomas with light and uplifting piano melodies that seem to flicker in and move with emotion, the way that shadows play their games on sunny days. “This music was composed during moments of solitude in the Swedish forest, reflecting on topics such as rootlessness, war, shame, and human connection to nature while also searching for moments of quietness, peace, and presence as I observed the trees, birds, and the interplay between light and shadows.” This is music perfect for those early mornings when the world is just about to wake up in preparation for another day of its self-created illusion hiding reality beneath its wavering veil. And it is not meant to be either right or wrong. It’s just precisely how it is and maybe even how it should be. Be sure to check out Gjertsen’s album, Formations, for which I premiered a piece titled “Cause And Effect“, selecting the release as one of the Best Albums of 2022 and proudly hosting her contribution to the benefit compilation For Ukraine.
nonkeen
All good?
We move on to the latest release by nonkeen, who first appeared with their debut album, The Gamble, on R & S Records in 2016. This project is a trio of Frederic Gmeiner, Sepp Singwald, and Nils Frahm (whose name and influence I’m sure you’ll recognise on this record), with this latest release migrating to Frahm’s Leiter label, which this celebrated pianist co-founded as a production platform with his managed Felix Grimm. The album seems to check in with our internal state of affairs, inviting a heart-warming answer: “Yeah, everything is alright here, I think…” But dig deeper past the jazzy keys and lighthearted drums (courtesy of Andrea Belfi), and you will find a homage to the “legendary Herbert Laser, the innovative mind behind ‘Laserjazz’ and a longtime musical inspiration for the band“. The titles of the tracks seem to deliver another [cryptic?] message, collectively revealing a mysterious [song] quote: “I am sure that love will never be a product of plasticity!” and yet the music itself is the opposite of being esoteric – it’s beautiful and easy and glowing and bright, with Frahm effortlessly traversing the scale with his feathered touch on his favourite Fender Rhodes. The whole set is highly cohesive, with the troupe more than just jamming together, creating something well-polished and refined. This album has many familiar and inspiring elements, from sparkling synth arpeggios to upbeat rhythms, combining the sounds and minds of these three childhood friends. I recommend filing this one somewhere between Tortoise, Floating Points, GoGo Penguin, Jaga Jazzist and Bersarin Quartett.
Unstern
Es Geht Der Tag
For the third entry in today’s column, we come upon a debut album from Unstern, a collaboration between ambient artist Arzat Skia and pianist Leo Svirsky. This release is courtesy of a London-based imprint, Alter, founded by Luke Younger, whom you should already know as Helm (check out his Olympic Mess on Pan from 2015). Es Geht Der Tag (which, now that I’m learning German, I can translate for you as “the day is coming”) is an atmospheric ambient offering, arriving with that flow and ebb of waves, with the bright piano keys sparkling across the stereo field the way that sun gleams on the ocean. Minimal on its surface and yet devotionally deep in texture and mood, the five long-playing pieces seem to lullaby you into a meditative state of trance, creating a sense of “temporal disorientation”, leaving you floating through its sonic, oddly familiar maze. “The results are an abundant audio illusion where what seemingly repeats slowly over time morphs in a manner where the destination escapes the departure point with extreme discretion.” Reminiscent of music by William Basinski, Ian Hawgood, bvdub (The Art of Dying Alone comes to mind here), and the beatless ambience of Gas. The album was beautifully mastered to tape by Stefan Betke (aka Pole), and it’s now available on a limited edition blue-coloured vinyl directly from the imprint’s Bandcamp. While there, dig around the catalogue and check out the sublime experimental lo-fi ambience of Tom James Scott, profoundly distorted industrial noise drone from FINAL, and some post-electro mutated power techno by CONTAINER (I really dig SCRAMBLERS from 2020).
