David Psutka has finally found the perfect home for his weird, experimental club output Egyptrixx?his own, newly announced label, Halocline Trance. The label is set to launch this year with Egyptrixx’s newest LP Transfer of Energy [Feelings of Power] on February 9?a raw, primitive record that toys with weight and structure. Halocline Trance is a vessel for Psutka’s “music, visual and collaborative projects”.
As with much of Psutka’s previous Egyptrixx output, tension and tranquility are the recurrent themes in Transfer of Energy. The rise, falls, and contrasting moments of violence and peace all play like a film score. Each element brings a gracefulness to the album, and evens out the preoccupation with structure and contrast.
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“I think I get interesting results with Egyptrixx because most of what goes into the music is a lot of non-musical ideas, which is why the songs are sometimes extreme or novel or curious,” he says. “I’m taking these odd concepts and introducing them to the project as an experiment.”
Psutka’s “tranquility and concussion”, comes in part from his early experiences with techno. Originally involved with experimental noise, Psutka was later captivated by the moments of real violence and serenity within techno tracks.
“I always found that really interesting, and to me, it almost felt like the same thing?you know the rush that you get from really heavy and intense parts of the music and the quiet parts, sometimes it feels like the same thing. I think what I’m trying to do is hijack some of the ingredients of club music and lay them bare, in more of a minimalist way. I like to strip everything away from them and sort of throw them out there, and let people worship them for what they are.”
The result of Psutka’s experiments, especially “Transfers of Power“, is a transfixing series of tracks that manage to be both an experiment in structural dissonance, and incredibly danceable. The album itself builds beautifully. A sonic narrative unfurls with a finely crafted fluidity?one that would make David Lynch smile. Even Psutka’s use of vocals doesn’t distract from the tension of the album. Instead, they play counterpoint to moments of dystopian eeriness in a subtle, delicate way, as with “Body II Body feat. Nyssa”.
Transfer of Energy [Feelings of Power] also features the work of Berlin-based artist ANF, who collaborated with Psutka previously on “A/B til Infinity”. “He’s really articulated the aesthetic of the project…so I think that [Egyptrixx] is now very much a visual or aesthetic project,” he says. “We did a lot of the visual performances last year. They weren’t without their own small challenges, but the ones that were good I thought were great, revelatory even.”
After the release of Bible Eyes and the subsequent tour, Psutka admitted to feeling slightly jaded about the whole electronic music scene. He was a little unsure about where he fit within it all. Two albums and four years later, he’s feeling less burnt out and a lot wiser as to where and when the Egyptrixx project works best.
“The Egyptrixx project is pretty weird, but it somehow gets embraced by these really different worlds of music,” he says. “Now I’m better at turning down the shows I know won’t go well, the ones that I know will be a conceptual mistake. But by the end of Bible Eyes I had done a lot of shows?some of them were really bad, and some of them shouldn’t have happened. It’s strange music and it doesn’t belong everywhere. There are certainly elements of dance music in what I do, but I felt like the odd one out on Night Slugs for sure.”
Aside from enjoying the freedom of releasing on your own label, Halocline Trance is Psutka’s opportunity to take advantage of the digital media landscape. Visual aesthetics have always been a crucial component to the Egyptrixx project, and the digital release offers him a way to develop that even further.
“I sometimes wonder why artists stick to the old conventions of releases, you know, releasing four songs as an EP or ten as an LP. Those limitations are physical limitations, whether it’s one piece of vinyl or two. Now things are all digital, it gives labels a lot more options for releasing and sharing music,” he says.
And he’s right. Now more so than ever, artists have the chance create and share immersive experiences with their listeners that push past the confines of traditional formats. Now that we’re not listening to CDs or vinyl as much as before, why should artists continue creating to suit them?
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