Birds of Passage is a psuedonym of New Zealand musician Alicia Merz. For “Dear and Unfamiliar” she has collaborated with Portugal’s Leonardo Rosado, and together they have created an album of dense, unsettling beauty. The release is available in CD & LP editions from Denovali Records, with equally beautiful artwork by Bruce Merz and mastering from Nils Frahm. If you want your music to do more than just soothe or distract, “Dear and Unfamiliar” has more than enough internal tensions and innovations to keep you listening from start to finish.
CD: special thick cardboard inner and outer sleeves.
LP: thick gatefold covers & thick white inner sleeves, comes with a free mp3 download code. 180g Vinyl.
"It’s late, but the temperature outside seems not to have dropped. Sounds cling like a layer of sweat, smother like a blanket, stick like dust. You listen, still but not relaxed. Lazy, but not comfortably so. Sliding through an almost intolerable heat. Drowsy but agitated at the same time. There’s no way you’re getting to sleep on such a humid night.
You are in India, or Indonesia, or somewhere in South-East Asia at least, somewhere hot. And humid. You thought the warmth would be pleasant after another cold northern European winter. It is not. Yet, it’s not exactly unpleasant either – that’s not the right word for it. More like: simultaneously sweet and unsettling. A languid state of emergency; a slow alert. You cannot move for all the solid weight of air pressing down on you. And yet, you cannot sit still."
Perhaps this goes some way towards explaining the classical Indian drone – constant movement without moving anywhere, a huge cloud of energy that seems to melt time even as it sharpens it… Perhaps such music could not have been developed without the state of highly agitated slowness that intense humidity brings. There are hints of classical Indian drone in the music you are listening to now – more classical than those European and American ambient soundscapes that often lay claim to the name ‘drone’. And yet there is a woman’s voice, she sings about Paris and lullabies and kisses, not in Hindi nor Brajbhasha but in English. The voice hangs heavy over fuzzy guitars, synths and manipulated acoustics like a heat haze over the horizon. The lush, warm sounds leave you unsettled and disarmed. They are as vague and intense as a dream, and they will not let you rest easy. “Dear and Unfamiliar” would seem a strikingly appropriate title. - Nathan Thomas for Fluid Radio
CD: special thick cardboard inner and outer sleeves.
LP: thick gatefold covers & thick white inner sleeves, comes with a free mp3 download code. 180g Vinyl.
"It’s late, but the temperature outside seems not to have dropped. Sounds cling like a layer of sweat, smother like a blanket, stick like dust. You listen, still but not relaxed. Lazy, but not comfortably so. Sliding through an almost intolerable heat. Drowsy but agitated at the same time. There’s no way you’re getting to sleep on such a humid night.
You are in India, or Indonesia, or somewhere in South-East Asia at least, somewhere hot. And humid. You thought the warmth would be pleasant after another cold northern European winter. It is not. Yet, it’s not exactly unpleasant either – that’s not the right word for it. More like: simultaneously sweet and unsettling. A languid state of emergency; a slow alert. You cannot move for all the solid weight of air pressing down on you. And yet, you cannot sit still."
Perhaps this goes some way towards explaining the classical Indian drone – constant movement without moving anywhere, a huge cloud of energy that seems to melt time even as it sharpens it… Perhaps such music could not have been developed without the state of highly agitated slowness that intense humidity brings. There are hints of classical Indian drone in the music you are listening to now – more classical than those European and American ambient soundscapes that often lay claim to the name ‘drone’. And yet there is a woman’s voice, she sings about Paris and lullabies and kisses, not in Hindi nor Brajbhasha but in English. The voice hangs heavy over fuzzy guitars, synths and manipulated acoustics like a heat haze over the horizon. The lush, warm sounds leave you unsettled and disarmed. They are as vague and intense as a dream, and they will not let you rest easy. “Dear and Unfamiliar” would seem a strikingly appropriate title. - Nathan Thomas for Fluid Radio
Birds Of Passage & Leonardo Rosado: ...
Dear and unfamiliar
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
Here's lookin' at you, kid
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
You wore blue
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
We'll always have Paris
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
A kiss is just a kiss
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
Of your charm
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
To wander slow with me
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
Your lullabies
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
I wonder if you sing it now
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
Endings and beginnings part
Birds Of Passage & Leon...
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