Best known for his sleek and futuristic electronic music recorded under the name Egyptrixx, David Psutka has shown just how wide of a scope he draws his influences from over the last few years, recording dark experimental folk with Anamai and bright bedroom pop with Hiawatha. Although Sign of the Cross Every Mile to the Border, the first release recorded under the moniker Ceramic TL, finds Psutka taking on experimental drone, it strangely comes off as some of his most accessible and candid pieces of work to date.
That's not to say it's not complex, as Psutka allows melodic and aurally pleasing samples to indiscriminately crash together and intersect, creating shimmering layers of cacophony. But each track, from the cascading, rain-on-tin build of "I attached to and pored over photos of places I loved that were reduced to ash" to the jittery, dense closer, "clearing," seems to work off of only one or two ideas, rarely changing gears or moods. Although much of Sign of the Cross Every Mile to the Border is beautifully executed and detailed, Psutka manages to make the arrangements more workmanlike than otherworldly.
(Halocline Trance)That's not to say it's not complex, as Psutka allows melodic and aurally pleasing samples to indiscriminately crash together and intersect, creating shimmering layers of cacophony. But each track, from the cascading, rain-on-tin build of "I attached to and pored over photos of places I loved that were reduced to ash" to the jittery, dense closer, "clearing," seems to work off of only one or two ideas, rarely changing gears or moods. Although much of Sign of the Cross Every Mile to the Border is beautifully executed and detailed, Psutka manages to make the arrangements more workmanlike than otherworldly.