SABIWA, Queimada, Nathan L. — Nothing blue

Taken from “Sons of _“ (EP, 8th November 2024, Phantom Limb) Footage shot by Gianluca Panareo () Edited by: SABIWA Buy track: Buy EP: Follow: SABIWA - Queimada - Nathan L. - ----------- Rising Taiwanese sonic and visual experimentalist SABIWA teams up with Italian duo Queimada and Nathan L. for the release of strange and beguiling new EP Sons of _, marrying disembodied field recordings and processed orchestral instrumentation with coruscating noise and half-forgotten Taiwanese folklore. All based in mainland Europe, but bringing divergent and itinerant influences to the mix, SABIWA, Queimada, and Nathan L. each represent complementary elements to the deep and unpredictable elixir that makes up their collaborative debut Sons of _. The record is characterised by SABIWA’s heavily processed singing voice fluttering and glitching in strange, coded languages within a heavenly but deserted CGI cathedral rendered from crashed software. Italian brothers Marco and Lorenzo Colocci (Queimada and Nathan L. respectively) are both well versed musicians, exposed to classical schools as well as the outerspheres of experimental music. Their contribution to Sons of _ can be felt in its no-input thumps, its crawling of mechanical insects, its devastating waves of crushing noise. Together, the trio push at sonic realities and temporal structure to form an indecipherable messaging. “A rediscovery of a new self, unrecognisable from its former shape,” they offer. “Nothing blue - 無憂無慮” feels culled from a dreamlike, alien mythology, fugged into disparate and divergent worlds as if the dust from a newly-collapsed Tower of Babel has still not settled. The track loops and swoons with raw distortion, James Bond fever dream strings, and SABIWA’s mystifying vocal experimentation before introducing a lolloping rhythm of church bells and crackling, staticky snare.