- A lovely but unsettling ambient collaboration between Buttechno and Perila.
- pmxper, the new collaborative record by Pavel Milyakov and Perila, is a trip through someone's uneasy dreams. The duo conjure images of empty landscapes and derelict rooms as seen and heard in great cinema. The guitars reverberate with the flair of film scores such as Neil Young's soundtrack for Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man or Ry Cooder's work in Paris, Texas. Its mechanical drum machine sounds recall the forbidding, subterranean pops and knocks in Mica Levi's score for Under the Skin. Even Perila's monotone spoken-word delivery evokes Laurie Anderson, whose "Speak My Language" proved so indelible in Wong Kar-Wai's Fallen Angels.
Both artists are extremely prolific. Perila, real name Aleksandra Zakharenko, favors an apprehensive, overcast style of ambient that seethes rather than soothes. She uses her Bandcamp page as a "sonic diary," spontaneously uploading tracks and EPs alongside releases on The Trilogy Tapes and other forward-thinking labels. Milyakov, meanwhile, skips around genres and aliases. His releases from this year include the ambient album project Mirrors and two records as buttechno that range from tech house (Minimal Cuts II) to drum & bass (In Your Head). But experimental sounds are another fixation—he frequently recruits musicians such as saxophonist/composer Alex Zhang Hungtai and vocalist Yana Pavlova, making records that resist easy categorization.
pmxper record benefits from the duo's shared inclinations, and a sense of foreboding wafts over the EP like a thick fog. "Stitch," with its bass guitar stabs and jazzy drumming, imparts a feeling of intense dread. If No Country for Old Men had music, this might be the sound of Anton Chigurh's deathly stalking. "Sweat Asphalt" combines plodding bass with ominous organ and saxophone, transporting us to a mental space that feels like an abandoned church where Zakharenko delivers incantatory lyrics: "She came here / Hundred times / Hundred and one is today / Today prolonged / Respond till yesterday."
Colossal Youth, the first and only LP by Welsh post-punks Young Marble Giants, is stated directly as an influence on the album's Bandcamp page, evident in the sparse tapping and hissing of the Rhythm Ace FR-3 drum machine used on several tracks. But Perila and her stream of consciousness poetry form the center of attention, giving the record its defining characteristic. Her voice is echoed, filtered and obstructed across the record.
On "Irrigation," she whispers to us as if trying to confuse or hypnotize: "Have you ever found yourself / Wanting one thing but doing something else instead? / Question mark / Every day another life / I am addressing several issues without expressing them / Hope you understand." There's a sharp contrast between the comforting, perhaps feminine objects invoked on certain tracks—"warm hues" and "milky lavender"—and the menacing instrumentals. It's as if she's walking through a barren landscape, describing things that used to exist in her world.
Tracklist01. Quiet Night
02. Turn 23
03. Stitch
04. Lavender Milk
05. Irrigation
06. Sweet Asphalt
07. Osouro