Posted June 14, 201114 yr Balam Acab WANDER / WONDER Tri Angle 28-08-11 http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Music/Pix/pictures/2010/12/2/1291306591406/Balam-Acab-006.jpg Background Talking of music designed to make children scream, here comes Balam Acab aka Alec Koone, who at 19 years old is, according to American drinking laws anyway, still a child himself. Even his name is frightening – Balam Acab sounds cryptic and vaguely medieval, as though he'd just stepped out of the Salem witch trials, which strictly speaking happened well after the middle ages, but stick with us. You can almost picture the scene. "Balam Acab, you stand before the village elders accused of not drowning in a body of water without recourse to plastic wings or a floating device of any kind. How do you plead?" Koone doesn't look much like a witch. In fact, he looks positively angelic. Look at that innocent face. Behold that – hold on, can hair be cherubic? Koone's is! It looks like his mum just cut it against his will with a kitchen bowl and some garden shears. It's hard to believe this clean-cut boy-child is responsible for music of such unearthly, eerie power and ghostly grace. Then again, Damien was cute and looked at the savagery he unleashed. Not that Damien was a musician who specialised in spectral computer drones interspersed by haunting keyboard tones and textures based around the most unsettlingly lovely chord sequences this side of oOoOO (those other New Band of the Day favourites from Tri Angle, the excellent label run by 20jazzfunkgreats blogger Robin Carolan). And not that there's anything savage going on in Balam Acab's music. If there is, it's implied. Koone just can't help himself. His songs – which evince an engagement with dubstep and UK bass music while also bearing traces of US R&B slowed down to a funereal 3bpm – are imbued with a dark and sinister quality, even when they are soft and serene, even at their most eight-bit ecstatic, with their harp glissandos and hymnal vocals; and even though he has admitted the songs are influenced by such anodyne waffle as "feelings, vibes, souls, spirits, nature, essences". The five tracks on his See Birds EP – especially See Birds (Moon) and Dream Out – are ethereally pretty but not in a prissy way, maybe because they're bolstered by bold basslines and reverberating subsonic beats. They call this music drag because it's like dance music dragged down by the ponderous weight of existence (there's a Balam Acab track called Heavy Living Things); they call it witch house because it haunts you long after you stop listening. Just make sure you keep it away from the kids this Christmas. (Paul Lester, The Guardian) http://www.residentadvisor.net/images/news/2011/balam-acab-wander-wonder.jpg 01 Welcome 02 Apart 03 Motion 04 Expect 05 Now Time 06 Oh, Why 07 Await 08 Fragile Hope Mr Koone seems to have stepped away from the more obvious of witchhouse influences with the lead piece from the upcoming album and gone for something more Air France in nature. Passing loops, a touch of the Balearic with a few rawer moments. Pitchfork have a free download of 'Oh, Why' HERE. I think the likes of Dandy*, Ryan and co should like this very much. His 'See Birds' EP is also well worth checking out...
June 14, 201114 yr I played the guy on my unsigned radio show last year. I didn't realize he is only 19, his music sounds more mature than that. It's decent stuff.
June 14, 201114 yr :wub: i have a friend who has a friend who's really good friends with him (lol not a claim to faim or anything but kinda neat). his music's awesome. one of his jamz was in a l'oreal (or whatever) commercial with beyonce which is crazy too.
July 20, 201114 yr http://soundcloud.com/tri_angle_records/balam-acab-apart Rather different from the EP tracks now, and still just as brilliant!
November 10, 201113 yr I don't normally GO for ambient, but a lot of this does qualify as it, even if the dubstep / R&B / whatever is still there: R1bKx7rUWig GORGEOUS. The whole album indeed. I'm likely to get bored of it fast, but the 'chipmunk' vocals really don't annoy me like they seem to for others!
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