SEAMS NACHTMUSIK

This is by no means new, but if you only go by what is 'new' in this world then you're going to have a pretty limited scope of what's gone on before you. Besides, something can still be new even if by definition it is 3 months or a year or more old - if it's your first time hearing it, it's new for you. And for much of the music in the world, I can imagine that to many ears it would sound very new indeed.

So before we leave past artists in the dust and stride disparagingly over them, casting cankerous silhouettes, let's take a closer look at those which are deserving of remembrance, despite their inability or failure to pierce the mainstream or to even be heard by more than a few thousand people. This isn't a manifesto, however, so don't start thinking I'm going all philosophical on yo azzes (even then, it's just a state of mind, not something we must shout to the world) and don't get uppity. Just a thought, yo.

A thought, cause this song 'Nachtmusik' by Seams (real name James Welch - British by birth, from Hampshire, now living in Berlin) is pretty old. But, like I said, anything you've never heard is new till you hear it. This comes from a EP of his called Tourist, released in 2011, and it is hypnotising, just like the person who recommended it to me said it was. Without further ado:

One of my favourite things, strangely, is unintelligible vocal samples, and this song has one on loop all the way through. The glockenspiel/xylophone vibes are a really nice touch, and the repetition on these is what gives the song its addictive, near trance-inducing quality. It's a bit glitchy, sounds a bit like Four Tet, just the kind of thing that's nice to hear in the morning, as it is now - but I'm sure it's very nice to hear at night, which is what I'm assuming the song is about.

It definitely does have a solitary feel about it (like Four Tet): maybe it's in the slow, hip-hop beat, or in the measured synth that fizzes by later in the song, or the scattered percussion, or the bleep-ridden frenetic loud parts of the song. But it just comes and goes, fading into ambient chatter much as it started, leaving just echoes of its synth like ripples on the background sample. L to the O to the V-E-L-Y.

And if you must know, he's signed to Full Time Hobby records.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Like Seams on Facebook
Listen to Seams on Soundcloud
Visit Seams' official site
Follow Seams on Twitter