Despite the unfortunate demise of once great American synth unit Emeralds, its members have done their damnest to keep the new projects flowing. This includes Steve Hauschildt, who will be coming back into our lives via a new solo album.
Called Strands, the album is due October 28 via Kranky. It will mark Hauschildt's first new full-length since 2015's Where All Is Fled.
To help explain where Hauschildt is coming from on the new record, he's released the following statement to help get us all up to speed:
Strands is a song cycle that is about cosmogony and creation/destruction myths. The title alludes to the structural constitution of ropes as I wanted to approach the compositions so that they consisted of strands and fibers which form a unified whole. This was so the songs could have the appearance of being either taut or slack without being fundamentally locked to a grid. So the sounds/tones have a certain malleability to them and sound like they're bending through time. It's also grittier and more distorted than my previous albums. I wanted to try and capture that moment in nature and society where life slowly reemerges through desolation, so it has a layer of optimism looming underneath. The music represents this by seemingly decaying at times but then reforms and morphs in a fluid way back to its original state. I was also inspired by the movement of rivers, particularly their transformative aspect and how they're in a state of flux and change, in particular the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland where I live, which notoriously caught on fire thirteen times because of industrial pollution in the 1960s and before. I was very interested in the dichotomy of oil and water and the resulting, unnatural symptoms of human industry. It's a very personal record for me as it is a reflection of my hometown where I grew up and where it was mostly recorded.
For a taste of the upcoming album, listen to the title track below, where you'll also find the record's tracklist.
Strands:
1. Horizon of Appearances
2. Same River Twice
3. A False Seeming
4. Ketracel
5. Time We Have
6. Strands
7. Transience of Earthly Joys
8. Die in Fascination
Called Strands, the album is due October 28 via Kranky. It will mark Hauschildt's first new full-length since 2015's Where All Is Fled.
To help explain where Hauschildt is coming from on the new record, he's released the following statement to help get us all up to speed:
Strands is a song cycle that is about cosmogony and creation/destruction myths. The title alludes to the structural constitution of ropes as I wanted to approach the compositions so that they consisted of strands and fibers which form a unified whole. This was so the songs could have the appearance of being either taut or slack without being fundamentally locked to a grid. So the sounds/tones have a certain malleability to them and sound like they're bending through time. It's also grittier and more distorted than my previous albums. I wanted to try and capture that moment in nature and society where life slowly reemerges through desolation, so it has a layer of optimism looming underneath. The music represents this by seemingly decaying at times but then reforms and morphs in a fluid way back to its original state. I was also inspired by the movement of rivers, particularly their transformative aspect and how they're in a state of flux and change, in particular the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland where I live, which notoriously caught on fire thirteen times because of industrial pollution in the 1960s and before. I was very interested in the dichotomy of oil and water and the resulting, unnatural symptoms of human industry. It's a very personal record for me as it is a reflection of my hometown where I grew up and where it was mostly recorded.
For a taste of the upcoming album, listen to the title track below, where you'll also find the record's tracklist.
Strands:
1. Horizon of Appearances
2. Same River Twice
3. A False Seeming
4. Ketracel
5. Time We Have
6. Strands
7. Transience of Earthly Joys
8. Die in Fascination