"...a rush of enveloping noise, a rhythmic blur possessing a great gravity that presses down on the listener... a vision of ambient music that feels proactive, filled with clanging atmospheric drones and lyrics that act as rhythmic counterpoints rather than exploring a sustained narrative." - Beats Per Minute
Releasing this Friday, April 15th, Cremation Lily’s debut album for The Flenser, Dreams Drenched in Static exists at the convergence of consciousness and disintegration. Glacial soundscapes float alongside earnest lyrics that capture the author in the midst of collapse.
Written throughout a culmination of years of chaos, Dreams Drenched in Static serves as part diary and part comfort blanket. The album was penned over countless sleepless nights and documents the liminal moments at the edge of sleep and the distressing thoughts that often accompany late-night R.E.M. disturbances. The lyrics were largely written in the darkest hours of the morning and serve to evoke reflection, depression and meditations on death that seem to haunt these early hours.
Today, the artist has released a never-before-seen performance video of the album’s title track. Curated and Edited by Jennifer Zsigo, the video was “recorded at home on a rain-soaked night, this performance of ‘dreams drenched in static’ makes use of crudely modified cassette machines, well-travelled samplers, the only guitar i’ve ever owned, electronic noise & my own voice. The wind & rain was battering the windows of my home, water rushing over glass, like a waterfall,” comments Zen Zsigo of Cremation Lily.
Through the use of radiant tape hiss and degradation, guitar noise, frenetic vocal melodies and field recording samples, Cremation Lily creates a distinctive sensory experience. At times ambient and atmospheric, at others meditative and euphoric, Dreams Drenched in Static floats back and forth from fantasy to reality. Zsigo’s penchant for creating and dismantling traditional songwriting by using one-of-a-kind home-modified devices such as cassette walkman, micro-cassette dictaphone, circuit-bent Casio keyboard, various sequencers and self-created and tape loops weathered by nature and environment, creates an aqueous and all-encompassing aural encounter. Zsigo comments, “The processing on the album and the concept of it is a product of how it was made. After expressing pain and suffering in the recording of the songs, I was often completely numb and felt like all I could do at times was process vocal stems via cassette or record gentle streams to layer over the album. The LP’s fractured mood comes from that more than anything.”
Through the use of radiant tape hiss and degradation, guitar noise, frenetic vocal melodies and field recording samples, Cremation Lily creates a distinctive sensory experience. At times ambient and atmospheric, at others meditative and euphoric, Dreams Drenched in Static floats back and forth from fantasy to reality. Zsigo’s penchant for creating and dismantling traditional songwriting by using one-of-a-kind home-modified devices such as cassette walkman, micro-cassette dictaphone, circuit-bent Casio keyboard, various sequencers and self-created and tape loops weathered by nature and environment, creates an aqueous and all-encompassing aural encounter. Zsigo comments, “The processing on the album and the concept of it is a product of how it was made. After expressing pain and suffering in the recording of the songs, I was often completely numb and felt like all I could do at times was process vocal stems via cassette or record gentle streams to layer over the album. The LP’s fractured mood comes from that more than anything.”
Cremation Lily has also been heavily influenced by a near-drowning experience and themes of water have been ongoing with the project. Zsigo comments, “I almost drowned in Summer of 2015 and the feeling has never escaped me. I was swimming in the sea when the tide was high and an undercurrent dragged me underneath the water. I was being washed further away from the coast and eventually would have become weak and drowned. For the first time in my adult life, I felt like this may actually be how I died. Light and sound, all around me. Luckily I was smashed against some rocks underwater and used them to claw my way back to shore. I had cuts all over my body. For weeks afterwards I had that light and sound surrounding me. It's a very distinct sensation, not unpleasant, but completely alien.” The listener can almost hear this experience throughout Cremation Lily’s music.
For over a decade, UK-based Cremation Lily has explored countless subsets of underground music and has consistently defined and redefined its boundaries. Continuing to defy genre, Cremation Lily presents the project’s most intentional and developed work to date with Dreams Drenched In Static.
