Review The Wire # 447 by Emily Pothast :
The second EP from the duo of Delphine Dora and Žils Deless-Vēliņš (who also records as Lunt) blends gestural piano editing, shapes with a disorienting melange of vocalisations and impressionistic percussion. It’s unclear what makes the « Post Apocalyptic Japanese Chaos » of the opening track Japanese per se, but chaos is palpable amid the bombastic poetry, sawing violin and tumbling drums. A half sung and half shouted hooting wail emerges from the din like the beam of a searchlight scanning the fragments, writhing and twitching like a field of dying insects.
The repetitive, spiralling piano melody that begins « Like Quiet Data Analysis » runs through this ten minute composition like a spine. A mystifying soundworld grows up around it, populated by crackling creaks, indistinct murmurs and cymbal swells. This minimalistic piano approach continues to anchor « How To Loose The Best Part Of You », where it is joined by detuned strings and a menacing chant, and « Central Colour Cycle », where it is adorned with soft hums, gruff grunts, and the bright ringing of a vibraphone (the whole-tone scale used in the latter composition strongly recalls Debussy’s « Cloches À Travers Les Feuilles » from Images).
The final track « The Uncertainty Of Psychic Growth » is the most contemplative. The liquid tone of an inquisitive electric guitar and a nest of scritching strings join the piano on a tentative journey that gradually grows to a dense and atmospheric tumult. In its final moments, the sampled voice of the British psychoanalyst Wilfred Bion may be heard speculating on music, philosophy and mathematics as possible methods for transcending the finality of death. Stationed at the end of this EP, it plays like a manifesto for the artists’ intentions.
Delphine Dora 