Ai fen - Daily Grief (2022)

Ai fen, also known as Ewelina Chiu, is a Polish-Chinese artist who is already quite recognizable here. She recently released her second album and while I used to associate her with modern experimental pop music, Daily Grief shows more of her airy and ethereal side.

While in general Ai fen is still all about the new, avant-garde approach to pop music, the pop that is everything but simple and boring, I find some elements from dream pop music particularly touching here. It's mostly about the artist's vocals, very often dispersed and whisper-like, contrasted with minimal bass lines, deconstructed club elements and extremely subtle electronica. In other places, they remind me of the glitch princess Yeule herself or the ambient pop dark eminency Nicole Dollanganger (like in The Muse) with their hinted emotional layers. While the nature of the vocals changes from track to track, the experimenting and fresh electronic music stays at the same, intriguing level.

The album was written under the influence of the pandemics and its regular negative impact on people's life, and is meant to cope with "grief beyond the general understanding as a reaction to a life shattering event", something we all have to deal with in those uncertain times. It comes as no surprise then, that the pinnacle of the album comes in COVID Techno, the only track here dominated by the dark disco vibes.

Daily Grief costs 6.5 EUR (150 CZK).

Check: Can You Believe?

Country: Poland/China/Czech Republic

Genre: dreamy avant-pop

Label: Tender Matter

:bandcamp:

:facebook:
:official:

:instagram:

:soundcloud:

:spotify:

Dear Laika - Rinzen (2018) EN

"Music like when there are stars but the sky isn't dark yet". Visionary artist known as Dear Laika has released her new album and it's so difficult to stop listening to. Mystical ambient filled with sadness and beauty is just one of labels you could use here if you wanted. But what for. It's better to listen to and cry.

Rinzen in Japanese means "sudden awakening". It is addressed in the most interesting track of the album, "Brenhilda's Wake", in which delicate but also very much unsettling in this delicacy sounds in the backgrounds accompany theatrical vocal and incapacitating choral that tops the track well. If you came for catchy melodies, you have to leave. But if you came for beauty, leaving is not possible.

The rest of the album is filled with dancing drones, samples and combination of singing and live instruments that sounds like a soundtrack from a musical (especially in "Leaves in Valombrosa"). Phenomenal.

"Rinzen" costs 3.50 GBP.

:bandcamp:

:facebook:

Dear Laika - Rinzen (2018) PL

"Muzyka jak ten moment, gdy widać już gwiazdy ale nie jest jeszcze ciemno". Wizjonerska artystka tworząca jako Dear Laika wydała nową płytę i trudno się od niej oderwać. Pełen smutku mistyczny ambient to tylko jedna z łatek, jakimi można ją obdarzyć jeśli się chce. Ale po co. Lepiej posłuchać i popłakać.

Rinzen to z japońskiego "nagłe przebudzenie". Ma to odbicie w najciekawszym na płycie "Brenhilda's Wake", gdzie delikatne ale też niepokojące w swojej delikatności dźwięki w tłach towarzyszą przejmującemu, bardzo teatralnemu wokalowi i wieńczącemu całość obezwładniającemu chórowi. Jeśli się przyszło dla chwytliwych melodii to trzeba wyjść, ale jeśli dla piękna to wyjść się nie da.

Reszta płyty to tańczące ze sobą drony, sample i kombinacja śpiew i żywe instrumenty brzmiące razem niczym w musicalu ("Leaves in Valombrosa"). Fenomenalna.

"Rinzen" kosztuje 16 złotych (3.50 GBP).

:bandcamp:

:facebook: