So my 2nd album is out, if you remember Loyal then this is his less lo-fi less moody cousin. Body Complex has a pulse to it, I needed to also make sense of my DJ sets which have always been Detroit Techno heavy so I set off to create that with a few honest thoughts, passions and a collection loops i’ve been working on over a 6 or so month span. I talk way more in depth about the album in its bio, a lot care has gone into not only the music but the piece of art I made for the cover. Hope you enjoy!
For Jakub Alexander, the languages of music and visual art are permanently intertwined. And he’s always been this way—from his birthplace in communist Poland, to growing up outside of Detroit, to his current home in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. “When music like Gas, early Dial Records, and Mille Plateaux releases in the 2000s popped up in my headphones,” Alexander begins, “it was completely visual for me. Something clicked from collecting pages out of old Architectural Digest magazines and being completely overwhelmed with inspiration for my own visions of interior architecture.” The concept carries on still, now as an integral part of Body Complex, his second album as Heathered Pearls. Body Complex represents a new form of Alexander’s visually inspired sound creation, but just as it points to changes in direction for the ambient-inclined producer, it also revisits the past experiences that make his music possible.
Perhaps the most important era referenced in Body Complex is Alexander’s mid-teens, when he was a 15-year-old DJ going to raves with the older kids. Sure, the parties themselves were influential, but it’s the afterhours that resonate the strongest on Body Complex. “I remember those mornings better than the holidays during those years, the drives home from Detroit at 7AM were always stimulating. Everyone was so content, we’d usually listen to something deep and easy on the ears. This was a perfect time to let your mind wander.” It was also an opportunity for him to discover the likes of Terrence Dixon and Lawrence, artists who would eventually offer encouragement to Heathered Pearls as he moved into a new beat-centric sound. “I respect [Terrence Dixon and Lawrence] because they can ride the same thin lines of what I love: electronic music that is heavily repetitive, melodic, and deep. They both can find this elegance in techno beyond the dark warehouse.”
Body Complex doesn’t necessarily aspire to recreate the music of Alexander’s youth. But while taking inspiration from !K7’s classic audio-visual mix series, X-Mix, and early-aughts techno compilations, Heathered Pearls has moved himself closer to the dancefloor. “Loyal was these indirect, huge, heavy, slow ocean waves off in the distance at night,” he says of his beatless debut album, “and Body Complex is a stunningly bleak, uncharted landscape of man-made cement and artificial foliage.” Take a track like the desaturated “Sunken Living Area”, where flickering synths and chrome-plated drum patterns sketch out Alexander’s conceptual backdrop. You can almost envision the sounds as columns and plateaus protruding from a dusk-lit valley. “Personal Kiosk”, an exuberant ambient-techno highlight with The Sight Below (who also mixed and mastered Body Complex), might best represent everything Heathered Pearls brings to his second album: whorls of deep texture, abstract melodic drifts, elegiac beauty, and illusory dance music.
Of course, the artwork is another integral aspect of Body Complex, especially as it was conceived around an object designed by Alexander. “The shape came from wanting to create an imperfect sculpture that, from a distance, looks like a display piece,” he shares, “but when you get closer and you have more time with it, you see its flaws.” And that sort of ever-changing perspective reflects how the album itself can be heard differently in various contexts. Put on the Shigeto-featuring “Abandoned Mall Utopia” at home, and it’s a softly pulsing current of astral dust; put it on in a DJ set, and the music becomes a heady balm for the dancefloor. “You’re given this body and mind to build on, and everyone has their imperfections they don’t love,” Heathered Pearls explains in regards to the double meaning of his album title. Indeed, Body Complex is an elaborate expression of personal memories and visual metaphors as nuanced electronic music, and just like any fully realized body of work, it’s best understood from more than one vantage point.
Really proud to announce my sophomore album ‘Body Complex’, there are a few things that come along with the announcement: the first single Interior “Architecture Software” which started streaming today. The record comes out August 7th on Ghostly International on vinyl/CD/Cassette, pre-order is below.
PRE-ORDER Coke Bottle Clear Vinyl / CD / Emerald Green Tinted Cassette HERE
This sculpture that I created which is about 7 inches tall and weighs close to 6 lbs made out of hydrostone which is a hi-tech cement pretty much. Also, I went more in-depth on the story of this album and sculpture below. As always, would love some feedback! Thanks for reading and listening.
For Jakub Alexander, the languages of music and visual art are permanently intertwined. And he’s always been this way—from his birthplace in communist Poland, to growing up outside of Detroit, to his current home in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. “When music like Gas, early Dial Records, and Mille Plateaux releases in the 2000s popped up in my headphones,” Alexander begins, “it was completely visual for me. Something clicked from collecting pages out of old Architectural Digest magazines and being completely overwhelmed with inspiration for my own visions of interior architecture.” The concept carries on still, now as an integral part of Body Complex, his second album as Heathered Pearls. Body Complex represents a new form of Alexander’s visually inspired sound creation, but just as it points to changes in direction for the ambient-inclined producer, it also revisits the past experiences that make his music possible.
Perhaps the most important era referenced in Body Complex is Alexander’s mid-teens, when he was a 15-year-old DJ going to raves with the older kids. Sure, the parties themselves were influential, but it’s the afterhours that resonate the strongest on Body Complex. “I remember those mornings better than the holidays during those years, the drives home from Detroit at 7AM were always stimulating. Everyone was so content, we’d usually listen to something deep and easy on the ears. This was a perfect time to let your mind wander.” It was also an opportunity for him to discover the likes of Terrence Dixon and Lawrence, artists who would eventually offer encouragement to Heathered Pearls as he moved into a new beat-centric sound. “I respect [Terrence Dixon and Lawrence] because they can ride the same thin lines of what I love: electronic music that is heavily repetitive, melodic, and deep. They both can find this elegance in techno beyond the dark warehouse.”
Body Complex doesn’t necessarily aspire to recreate the music of Alexander’s youth. But while taking inspiration from !K7’s classic audio-visual mix series, X-Mix, and early-aughts techno compilations, Heathered Pearls has moved himself closer to the dancefloor. “Loyal was these indirect, huge, heavy, slow ocean waves off in the distance at night,” he says of his beatless debut album, “and Body Complex is a stunningly bleak, uncharted landscape of man-made cement and artificial foliage.” Take a track like the desaturated “Sunken Living Area”, where flickering synths and chrome-plated drum patterns sketch out Alexander’s conceptual backdrop. You can almost envision the sounds as columns and plateaus protruding from a dusk-lit valley. “Personal Kiosk”, an exuberant ambient-techno highlight with The Sight Below (who also mixed and mastered Body Complex), might best represent everything Heathered Pearls brings to his second album: whorls of deep texture, abstract melodic drifts, elegiac beauty, and illusory dance music.
Of course, the artwork is another integral aspect of Body Complex, especially as it was conceived around an object designed by Alexander. “The shape came from wanting to create an imperfect sculpture that, from a distance, looks like a display piece,” he shares, “but when you get closer and you have more time with it, you see its flaws.” And that sort of ever-changing perspective reflects how the album itself can be heard differently in various contexts. Put on the Shigeto-featuring “Abandoned Mall Utopia” at home, and it’s a softly pulsing current of astral dust; put it on in a DJ set, and the music becomes a heady balm for the dancefloor. “You’re given this body and mind to build on, and everyone has their imperfections they don’t love,” Heathered Pearls explains in regards to the double meaning of his album title. Indeed, Body Complex is an elaborate expression of personal memories and visual metaphors as nuanced electronic music, and just like any fully realized body of work, it’s best understood from more than one vantage point.
With a 3rd single dropping from the new Tame Impala album, I had to reach out to the graphic designer behind the beautiful madness, so tap in and get inside Robert Beatty’s head the man behind the cover art for TI and many others.
Name: Robert Beatty
Current city: Lexington, Kentucky
Pets: Mr. Smith (toy poodle), Blue Velvet (chihuahua)
Studio setup: In home, basically in my kitchen
ISO50: Share a childhood memory that might relate to your design? I drew constantly as a kid, but I was generally just very curious and wanted to find out how everything worked from the inside out, which is definitely the way I treat design and music. I remember discovering video feedback with the family camcorder when I was in maybe 4th grade or something. Circuit bending not long after that. I was always taking things apart and getting in trouble.
ISO50: If you couldn’t create music or design in your life, what would you be doing? I can’t really imagine doing anything else and being happy. I did a few years of renovation/construction work in the past and enjoyed that quite a bit even though it’s exhausting. I definitely can’t see doing something that doesn’t involve making something in some way.
ISO50: How did you doing Tame Impala album art come about? is this how most of your graphic work comes to you? Kevin was familiar with my work and got in touch. Usually if I don’t know someone or have mutual friends people just reach out to me after seeing my work elsewhere, I’m pretty accessible.
ISO50: Tell us about Tame Impala album art and the influences? Kevin’s ideas for the album artwork were all based on turbulent flow, the way liquid or air flows around objects. He sent over a bunch of images of diagrams that I took inspiration from. Everything was very open and they let me interpret things in my own way. It worked well with the kind of stuff I’ve been interested in doing lately. I’ve been trying to incorporate more op-art and moire techniques into the record covers, and this was the perfect opportunity.
ISO50: Can you list off a 4 song playlist of what you listen to while you do your graphic work? I listen to music constantly while working and it is always all over the place, but here’s some stuff I’ve been playing a lot lately.
Nuno Cannavaro – Alsee Brother Ah – Enthuiasm Bo Anders Persson – Love Is Here To Stay Dendo Marionette – Walts (For Lautréament)
ISO50: Something your fans might not know about you? I grew up on a cattle/tobacco farm. I also showed rabbits in the county fair as a kid.
ISO50: Do you collect anything? My collection of art and design books is starting to get out of hand. I’m kind of a pack rat, so I have small collections of a lot of weird stuff- keys, prisms/interesting glass objects (which come in handy for shooting photographs and video through), objects with brick patterns, plants. Obviously I’ve got some records and tapes too.
ISO50: What is the first album cover that pops up in your head and why? Pretty much anytime anyone asks me this question all I can think of Isadore Seltzer’s (of Pushpin Studios fame) cover to Bruce Haack’s “Electric Lucifer” LP. It’s got the perfect balance of 70’s illustration, geometry, crudeness, and precision that I love. Doesn’t hurt that it’s one of my favorite records too.
ISO50: What do you have lined up for the rest of the year? I’ve been working for a while now on an art book of all new material that will be out later this year. I’m planning some new work for a few exhibitions that are in the works. On the music side of things I’ve got a few Three Legged Race EP’s I’m finishing up that will be out this year as well. I’m also starting a new tape label to put out some of my music and some music by my friends early this summer. I’m working on some new soundtracks for a few short videos by Takeshi Murata right now. Lots of record covers and posters too as always.
In a time where the devaluation of music seems to be at it’s peak, fans and audiences expect every release to be either for free or donation based, which forces musicians to tour extensively or resort to day jobs in order to support themselves. Deru, an electronic artist who questions this establishment, explores an innovative release of his latest album, 1979. His approach influences listeners to place themselves in an appropriate listening environment, delivering an entirely new experience.
To help him with his vision, Deru enlisted a team of people including the visual artist, Effixx, who collaborated previously on the Outliers, Iceland: Vol. 1 project.
I sat with Deru & Effixx to discuss the themes and concept behind 1979:
With Tycho’s Awake, out March 18th via Ghostly, the Sacramento-based audiovisual project helmed by Scott Hansen has reached a certain maturity, growing into a three-piece band and achieving, on the new record, an even more refined sense of clarity. Awake takes the evocative, pop-ambient synth work that made 2011′s Dive feel so oddly spiritual (and drew countless comparisons to Boards of Canada) and refocuses it into a cleaner, sharper post-rock context; it feels like an album that should be broadcast at night over the Grand Canyon. I spoke to Hansen about growing out of “the Instagram approach” to music producing, making headphone music work live and why he considers this “the first true Tycho record.”
The Fader: Where am I talking to you now?
Tycho: We’re in the studio, working on the live show. I’m working with the engineer who helped mix the record to translate the recorded stuff live. Last album, we struck the balance between having the live show sound more like the record, but over time, we decided we wanted a more ability to go off the beaten path, and we’re trying to skew the balance back to the performance end of things. It’s kind of headphone music at the end of the day, especially the older stuff, so we’re always trying to punch it up.
The Fader: You’ve called this “the first true Tycho record.” Why do you feel that way, even though you’ve been at it for a little while?
Tycho: I look at it from a career perspective, like what I was doing in my life when I made those other albums. My life revolved mostly around freelance graphic design work, and I wasn’t truly focused on music in the way that I am now. And back then, I hadn’t met musicians that I really resonated with in a songwriting context. Meeting Zac, meeting Rory and meeting Count, the engineer—forming relationships with them where we were comfortable enough to start creating together is what facilitated making this record the way I wanted. It was always my dream for Tycho to get to that point, it just took me 10 years to get there. This is what I wanted Tycho to be all along.
The Fader: So it’s a proper band now.
Tycho: Now I kind of look at at is: I’m in a band, and I play keyboards and guitar and bass, and I also produce that band. You put on two different hats. Working with Zac in particular, we came up with basic ideas and then spent time in different places for a couple weeks at a time working through them, developing songs. Then I went back and produced them out, and we spent a few weeks at the end flashing and burning and doing the hard decisions I wasn’t objective enough to make in the past. From songwriting to arrangement, we worked really closely. Rory, the drummer—I always hear these drum patterns and swells in the music, but I’ve never had the ability or energy to achieve that with electronic programming. He was able to just sit down, hear the music and go.
One of my first vinyl purchases of 2013 really held up, Umberto has this way with that horror soundtrack sound that doesn’t veer off into its normal vintage pigeon hole. There’s beautiful synth work all the way to the last song, my personal favorite has to be track 2 “Initial Revelation”.
I knew right away that i’ve fallen in love with an album when I can’t even get past the first 2 songs because i’ve put them on repeat. Go deep with this one, its a very rewarding listen.
Started a new disco edit series on Moodgadget, we’re actually taking demos(info below), i’ll keep posting them on the blog, with art direction from longtime ISO50 commenter H34dUp.
Moodgadget presents a new series of split singles, featuring disco edits from Brooklyn Bass helmsman Evan Michael, and introducing the secret edit project of veteran Moodgadget designer, Alex Koplin, as Choplin. An update to one of the SOS Band’s classic hits, “After All” adds a bass heavy push and pull with minor chords and glitzy arpeggiation creating a new dynamic. “Never Forget” presents a re-working of Dexter Wansel honing in on an impeccable groove you might have inadvertently passed over in the original. – Moodgadget
To submit a demo to the series: info at moodgadget dot com
