CUUSHE — HOLD HALF

⌾ LISTEN TO CUUSHE, HOLD HALF ⌾

---

In a scramble of beats, a festival of lights, Tokyo-based musicmaker Cuushe introduces her new album, Waken. Drums and synth explode triumphal in 'Hold Half', a twisting number that balances its way between these sonic fireworks of crashing cymbals and sun bursting over the horizon brilliance, and quieter moments of pinging icicle guitars and soft watercolours of sound, an early hours out of body experience.

It's all brought to life with a sudden alarm clock saw wave buzz, the moment of awakening. Cuushe's vocals drop in, slow, vital, trance-like, somewhat obscured by the same whispering ambience that has always made her voice unique. Less faraway and somnolent than on previous releases, Cuushe's voice this time cuts through the music like wings through cloud.

And there is this sense of flight in 'Hold Half', at least that of floating, being airborne. Looking down on all that's come before, Cuushe joins her track as it heads towards the cold pastels of dawn.

---

• 🔔 'Hold Half' is taken from Cuushe's forthcoming new album Waken, set for release 20th November on her label home flau. Pre-order it over on the flau bandcamp.

---

📠
☟ Cuushe Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ wikipedia ⚘

---

🐣 ZAP HOLMES — FLAKED OUT DREAMING

⌾ LISTEN TO ZAP HOLMES, FLAKED OUT DREAMING ⌾

---

This track floats along on two separate plain. One is this floating nebulous feeling, a flowing tide like the watercolours of a dreamscape, the melting mind of somewhere unknown, the swells of the tide of the unsconscious, sweeping along and founding this track on wholly ambient terrain. Like floating through space, it's the infinity of slumber.

On the other hand, it feels close and intimate, though detached and lonely, like the charting and observation of a biomechanical organism. The way samples chant in regularity, lo-fi and wheezing like some artificial life process, ticking percussion keeping time and clacking and sounding the cogs of static motion, trickling along like a living engine.

And that makes sense. Swedish musicmaker Zap Holmes tells us his inspiration for the track was his dreaming girlfriend.

"My girlfirend like to sleep and sometimes for many hours. And I made this track during one of those times," he said. "Got some recordings on my iphone when we messed around at home so I put some samples of her in the song also."

So 'Flaked Out Dreaming' has this sense of being alive in suspended animation, a grand dream arcing over whilst all the time no time is moving at all; those hazy, crackling samples counting the seconds till consciousness. It's an epic of sleep, where it culminates in these sometime crashing waves of charged white noise distortion, twinkling lights like neurons firing on the cusp of waking.

---

• 🔔 This is taken from Zap Holmes' Bluescreens EP - all of which he made on a "crappy little laptop when my main computer was broke. Was stuck with almost no samples and an old version of Reason."
• 🔔 You may stream or download 'Flaked Out Dreaming' via your fav service on this link right here.

---

---

📠
☟ Zap Holmes Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ bandcamp ⚘ twitter ⚘ youtube ⚘ instagram ⚘ spotify

---

---

🐣 POOL BOY — OLD DOG NO TRICKS

The first thing here is a sense of familiarity. Though it is new and from a new artist going by the name of Pool Boy, the bassline is a constant refrain of the first four beats of the bassline in 'Don't You Want Me' by The Human League. Intentionally, it is an innocent nod to something everybody knows. Unintentionally, it shows the pervasive nature of "classics" of the late 20th century. Either way, there it is; and 'Old Dog No Tricks' continues with a clatter of disco percussion, scathing hi-hats, cool lounge bongos, smart handclaps.

The heaviest element of the track is that bass. Above that close-quarters groove the feel is one of haze and otherworldliness. A constant fog of ethereal synth creeping across the floor; and above that a twinkling cluster of notes hangs in the air. Lead melodies spin like submerged guitar solos, muffled and wavering. Against this mirage of sound, like a disco in a dream, real world noises pour in: birdsong, fresh and innocent, and the wash-crash of the sea, expansive and farsighted—as with the musical elements, it is light and heavy combining.

---

• 🔔 This appears courtesy of London label Coastal Haze as a single ahead of the Pool Boy LP, scheduled for release on 22nd January. You can pre-order it digitally or on cassette from Bandcamp.
• 🔔 The description of the track reads: "Produced overlooking the port of Vancouver but ..who is Pool Boy?!" We have an inkling.

  1) The track itself was reposted by Cyril Hahn.
  2) One SoundCloud comment reads: "At last more music by Cyril!"
  3) Also he is Canadian, and it was produced in/near Vancouver.

  But we shall see.

---

---

📠
☟ Pool Boy Internet Presence ☟
?????

---

---

🐣 LILAC — FEELINGS

Huge. The expanse of it, the ambience of it, the wild sandstorm blight of it, the pastel colour pleasantries taken and ripped to shreds and thrown in mad gallons of confetti across the every corner of Earth, the wind-up toy nature of it, but without that metal key at the back instead it spends a third of its duration inhaling air, capturing energy like charging a spirit bomb and gradually that meter is filling and—bloop! It reaches the top and this wondrous track charges into life, crowds the air like a cloud wrapped round a goddess cartwheeling to the ground the loudness of it crunching like thunder. And afterwards it fades into the ether, gorgeously slipping away into silence.

lilac's track 'feelings' is quite literally a long explosion of sound, thick layers of gossamer fibres glowing grey and pink and teal and then more robust rumblings under these electric coils of noise, a beat if you can even call it a beat like ultra-slowed trap, the kick overdriven self-detonating, delayed satisfying sidechaining with each distorted boom, sharply crashing cymbals cracking with each slow syncopated percussive hit, dynamic clusters of rattling snares, clipped handclaps keeping time for this gargantuan swaying rhythm. How soft at the same time, how muffled, the rounded cushioning of it, the feathering, the tenderness of it and how that tenderness warps and self-destructs into obsessive longing, a swirl of sound, of feeling, that takes up every surface every empty nodule of the mind.

---

• 🔔 More fabulous tracks from lilac are available in a streaming as well as downloadable medium over on their Bandcamp.
• 🔔 Must admit: originally led to lilac because their profile pic is Lindsay (played by Linda Cardellini) from Freaks And Geeks.
• 🔔 Affiliated with SoundCloud collectives you may know: otter boys, Tsundere Fan Club, and REGRET.

---

---

📠
☟ lilac Internet Presence ☟
soundcloud ⚘ bandcamp ⚘ twitter

---

---

🐣 MOON MASK — TWENTY MINUTES DREAM RUNNER

Like a heavy heart this track shifts its way into your perception, that sinking stomach feeling, emptiness, beginning with a slow ominous luscious clopping clock and insectoid ticking and slumbering breaths and then we fall into the urgent synthpop of it all, and the vocals of Manila's moon mask opens up a deep croon: "Met you asleep in a dream…" Big thumping drums create a driving energy – a gotta-do-something '80s filmic montage of an atmosphere – with simple kick-snare alternation with stomping gloopy bass that cuts a basic booming groove beneath the miasma of electronics that glide and soar and punctuated by sparkling starlit melodies twinkling beneath it, bright neon chords electrify the heavenward introspective gloom of it, shocking strobes in the murksmoke.

But the dreamy atmosphere that dwells in 'twenty minutes dream runner' arises because, moon mask explained on Twitter, it's "based off a short story I wrote once about a decaying man reliving dream." There is indeed an aroma of decay that whirls around in this synth-laden dreamscape, the cardinal reverb that the drums are soaked in so they crack and roar in the song's verses, and in the literally decayed melody that twists and turns fizzing abrasive in the bridge, overdriven and piercing. The chorus is catchy, deliciously so, with rapid pogoing vocals: "20 minutes better run baby ah, 20 minutes left before they take you away…" A fantasy lovesong, an electronic pop elegy, this is the idealised grip of nostalgia manifested in the hazy hangover of something distantly dreamt.

---

• 🔔 You may purchase 'twenty minutes dream runner' digitally via Bandcamp if you like. It arrives ahead of moon mask's EP scheduled for release early next year; "I've been trying to take a bit of a new direction in my sound," says our boy in the track's description, and the new EP will probably mirror that sentiment.

---

---

📠
☟ moon mask Internet Presence ☟
Facebook • SoundCloud • Bandcamp • Twitter • Tumblr

---

---

🌭 CULT EXCITER — GET

A warped tropical island feel permeates this track, a wash of what might be steel pans muffled and softened and stretched out into languorous mists of sound, little clouds of chill ambience that summon breezeblown beaches and blue skies as much as the sultry potential of nocturnal outings. Like palm trees in the calm croon of coastal air, these nebulous sounds sway in slow-motion as the the dancehall-flavoured beat skips onwards—the party continues to pop all around but the focus is on this feeling, this fluid electric connection, this illustration of amorous aurae by LA-based duo, Cult Exciter.

Having their origins in Dominican Republic, the musicmakers understandably infuse 'Get' with Caribbean lilt, in that rhythmic swing of the beat, in the smooth fragmented bass that grooves gently throughout. Elsewhere this is a dreamlike excursion. The vocals, indistinct and slurred and doused with reverb, seem to come from elsewhere, from a memory, from a premonition, and fit effortlessly with the fumes of sound that soothingly intoxicate—all this, plus the brushstrokes of spontaneity in the sudden sprinklings of bubbling chiptune bleeps with their matter-of-fact anything-could-happen-ness, generates a sense of magical realism, where something about this club experience is not altogether of this world, where a dream materialises on the dancefloor.

---

• 🔔 'Get' is taken from Cult Exciter's debut EP, out 23rd June on Point Records.

---

---

📠
☟ Cult Exciter Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ twitter ⚘ instagram

---

---

BRAYDO – I THINK I SAW YOU IN MY DREAM LAST NIGHT

I stumbled upon this the other day and I was like "whaaat" so I put it on a to-write-about list like "yeahhh" then forgot about it and then I rediscovered it just now like "whaaat" again. Safe to say it's a tasty tune and one that suits the spring palette and most hopefully will delight your palate. Hm. Two different words, two different meanings, sound the same. Homophone.

So this is a track by braydo, who is a musicmaker from Washington, as far as I can tell. It's called 'i think i saw you in my dream last night' and instantly, without even having to think about it, I can feel that fleeting feeling of glimpsing a welcome human presence within a dream, fantasy love welling up from the hidden recesses of the heart, where your more rational, waking mind archives them for safe-keeping. Or maybe I'm just being melodramatic.

The constant pulmonary plume of bass in this song is a soft, exacting rumble, like it's the kind of intense ambient sound you'd hear if you were a miniaturised person floating inside a human body, like in The Magic School Bus or that film Innerspace. A very organic sound.

On top of this, plaintive synth flute sounds chime in and out of earshot, indistinct and glistening, soaked with reverb, just like the vague outlines of a beautiful dream, with a steady contemplative beat dishing out thumping kicks and lo-fi snares, a wandering hi-hat pattern split between something more simple in the song's first half and gently ornamented, busier strains in the second.

This clear twoness of the track is bridged by a subsidence in the rich rumble of the bass, linking the initial appearance of the mystery dream person in the first half of the track, to the heartmelting recognition and realisation in the second section, where plunking almost pizzicato synth mix with continual muffled vox sounds: the shard of light and love that does not physically or actually change much, but accentuates your surroundings and lightens your mind.

But at the same time, dreams are essentially mirages, and the turmoil of tumbled-down beliefs that your subconscious mind stacked up during the night, leading you to believe real, actual passages of time were passing, real emotions felt, physical people interacted with – all evaporates as you surface once again into reality.

---

---

☟ braydo Social Media Presence ☟
SoundCloud • Bandcamp • Twitter • Instagram

---

---

LOUMAR – GROUND

I stumbled across this the other day and was literally like wtf where has this been hiding. It is an EP called AVRIL by Parisian musicmaker, Loumar. Bass-heavy, experimental and all-encompassing, it is a captivating collection of sounds. To give you an idea of what that is like, I've selected 'GROUND' (or 'Ground'? whatever) – surprisingly the least popular track on the EP, but by far the most… unique.

Beginning with, and punctuated throughout by, samples from the 2012 Wes Anderson film Moonrise Kingdom, it feels like an ode to dreams – not sleepy dreams, but waking, real-life, what-do-you-want-to-do-when-you're-older dreams; the kind of dreams that you forget and remember years later having done nothing about them. In 'GROUND', Loumar presents a personality that will support your dreams, the booming submarine kicks of the beat playing beneath the repeated words: "I don't let you hit the ground, no."

But this head-in-the-clouds mentality is underpinned by a miasmic soup of sounds, a confused swirling of clap clusters, ambient whale-song synth, disco-conjuring cowbells alongside ticking shakers – suggesting that this is the ground, i.e. real life, somewhat doom-laden, deep, and difficult to comprehend at the best of times. Even the refrain itself is spookily pitch-shifted, effusing this feel of dangerous delusion; you would think that the sample at the end – "I wanna go on adventures, I think. Not get stuck in one place" – would cancel this out, carve out a warmer feeling, but even this is cold.

On the whole, it feels like inverted dance music, narcotic and nauseating, dysphoric, warped beyond recognition, leaning almost towards witch-house in genre (if you excuse my saying so), having extended its tendrillar feelers into the deeper burrows of Loumar's mind. But it's brilliant.

• Check out Loumar's Avril EP over here. Dead deer at the bottom of the pool on the cover so yeah.

---

---

☟ LoumarSocial Media Presence ☟
Facebook • SoundCloud • Twitter • Tumblr • YouTube • Vimeo

---

---

PA'S LAM SYSTEM – LIKE A LADY

To make something like this – already so cosmically engaging and bustling with energy – to sound as interesting and exciting as it does for as long as it is must take some skill, some talent, but also hard work, patience, and, of course, good ears. To keep it so full of life all the way through, with its dramatic acrobatics, to maintain unending zest and intrigue, this takes love – not necessarily for the finished product, because a day is not there for the sunset alone, but for the process of creation itself: for the movement, order and flow of action.

Wow um ok, so that's what Japanese trio Pa's Lam System kind of does here in their latest track called 'Like A Lady', synonymous with the words sung by its ornamental sped-up female vocal sample. It's a song that stays fresh all the way through. Nothing is overused: a water droplet plinks only, "Hey!" samples are used with consideration, an arpeggio that weaves dreamily in and out of the forefront, a vinylesque drum and bass sample rattles only in one place… And that's not to mention the composition itself, the expansive rainbow chords and their wild somersaults and mad flips, the contented magical melody in the song's calm finale, the virtuosic power of the drums, the flighty adventuresome synth solo, the bass like controlled explosions of pure silk gloss underpinning all of the above greatness. It really takes your mind for a ride.

Also it might just be me, but it's mastered low enough to be able to turn the volume right up… it's kind of satisfying that I go to turn the volume up on this one and it's already FULL PELT ✔

• This fantastic slice of inverted-Jersey-Club footwork from these Maltine playmates stands next to a very different but also quite amazing beast called 'Twin' by Hyper Juice on the 2-track Hypa'slam EP, a collaboration between the two artists available nowhere except on your computer for streaming.

---

---

☟ Pa's Lam System Social Media Presence ☟
SoundCloud • Twitter

---

---

FINDSERENE – いつまでも、私と恋に落ちる

It's another short one, a looped beat that doesn't quite reach the 2-minute mark. However, it is also two other things simultaneously: the latest track from Bangladeshi beatmaker Findserene (as in "Find" and "Serene"), and also the perfect track to suit its creator.

As you can see, the title is in Japanese: roughly it means 'Forever, Fall In Love With Me' – for now, let's call it that. On the other hand, it reflects Findserene as an artist; one trip to her Tumblr will tell you about feeling like an outcast because of her interests (anime, Japanese culture), and how she one day decided to just make beats, despite what anybody might have said. And in this creative outlet we see and hear Findserene's interests surface, turning herself into a kind of cultural conduit, a nation-bridging spirit from Bangladesh's Faridpur District.

The track itself is delicate and dreamy, a hypnotic lo-fi sound with a thin mist of a beat adorned with shimmying shakers and popping electronic toms in place of kick-snare patterns. Glittering melody cascades through the low, sparse membrane of the drums, like old memories flooding into a heart full of longing. The fade-in & fade-out makes it seem like we have just been blessed with a brief opening into a very serene place indeed, like walking down a street and hearing the murmurs and sounds of living from windows up above; the heaven of now.

You don't necessarily need very long to tell how good someone is at making music, or how well they can inject their own emotion into their creative output – almost as if the two were one and the same – and 'Forever, Fall In Love With Me' is a perfect example of that. Let's hope there are more & even greater things to come from this musicmaker in the future!

• What you can do in the meantime is check out Findserene's debut EP 2202, released via Magic Yume Records.

---

---

Like Findserene on Facebook
Listen to Findserene on SoundCloud
Hear more Findserene on Bandcamp
Follow Findserene on Twitter
Check Findserene on Tumblr

---

---

ULZZANG PISTOL – PASTEL 女の子 (ET ALIAE REMIX)

Welcome. If you've never been here before, well done to you; if you have been here before, well done to you, too. Basically, we're here today to talk about a remix of a song, or perhaps more specifically a remix of a track. I actually heard the original track, 'PASTEL 女の子' (where '女の子' – onnanoko – means 'girl' in Japanese), a few weeks ago and thought "hmm ooo yea I'ma write bout dat" but it seems it never happened. However, now that I'm here, and you're here, it's the perfect time to give it a sprinkling of spotlight.

So yes, the original, by Filipino musicmaker Ulzzang Pistol – who also heads up the Philippines-centric Youngliquidgang collective – is a Latin-flavoured slice of synth-lounge, complete with groovesome bassline, 80s-drum-machine tom fills and glimmmerings of glockenspiel. A kind of laid-back, easy-listening, city-by-night feel, flourishing in its own sense of romance.

Made for and taken from the net-station/label datafruits.fm compilation, Funky Freaky Freestyley, Ulzzang Pistol put it up with downloadable stems, allowing anybody to remix it. And that's exactly what et aliae (which means 'and the others/rest' in Latin, but it's feminine plural so could be translated as 'the other girls' or sth like dat) has done.

Mixing the dizzy potential of R&B-inflected beats and neon-tinged tremolo synth chords with softly reverbing marimba and gentle glassy cascadings, the London-based et aliae produces a stunning remix that simpers high above the original; a persistent ghost of swirling cloud-sounds that summon silver-outlined dreams.

Say, if the original was the actual soundtrack to a person wandering around the heart of a city replete with bustling streets and entertainment at every turn: then this remix is that person's out-of-body experience, their true consciousness floating as their body is jostled by crowds, beset on all sides by relentless sights and sounds and smells, seeking without end something indescribable.

Or at least, that's what I get from it... so uh...

• HEY! LISTEN! You can download this lovely pot of jam HERE (cliicky-cliiiiiick)
• This has been released on international netlabel, MAGIC YUME: "Promoting dreamy music from a magic world."
• FEEL LIKE REMIXING THIS URSELF? Then go for it (stems for download).

---

---

Like xxx on Facebook
Listen to Ulzzang Pistol on SoundCloud
Follow Ulzzang Pistol on Twitter
Check Ulzzang Pistol on Tumblr

Like et aliae on Facebook
Listen to et aliae on SoundCloud
Follow et aliae on Twitter

---

---

LAZY INTERVIEW #14: CUUSHE

---

← #14: THE ORWELLS #16: ARISTOPHANES 貍貓 →

Perhaps you know or perhaps you don't, but I wrote about Japanese singer and trackmaker Cuushe's new album, Butterfly Case, on Monday - the day of its international release. Far from replicating that highly positive review that I wrote (all things are positive; cast your negativity aside), I will say simply that it is the kind of album that grips you at first, cradles you, and then lays you gently down for sleep - by the end of it, when it finishes, it feels as though you've just awakened from a trance. That's the kind of music that Cuushe makes: dreamy, otherworldly, beautiful.

Cuushe herself, once based in Berlin but now back in Japan, was very kind enough to answer some questions for me, for YES/NO, for the good of the age old tradition of finding out more about something you like. She comes across very well, but for somebody who makes such... well, "human" music - deep with feeling - you would expect her to be a very nice person and she is indeed very nice.

Here is what she had to say...

---

---

Who are you? Where are you from? What do you do?
　Hi I am Cuushe. I am from Kyoto and I make music.

Why did you decide to start creating music?
　Naturally I started to create music from when I was little girl using piano, because my mum made me to go to piano lessons, and I didn't like to practice, but I liked to play piano improvisationally. That was the start of me creating music.

How would you describe your sound? What makes you and your style stand out?
　My sound is "Dream Pop", I call it. It's like dancing in dreams. Sometimes it's under the water, sometimes it's on another planet.

Is there a perfect time and place for listening to your music?
　I almost always make music in the night, so night is a good time for my music, and maybe sunrise and sunset time!

What inspires you most when writing a song?
　My emotions. When I am sad, I make a sad song, but sometimes I would make a happy song to make me happy.
　And when I want to dance or I am high, I make an up-tempo song. And of course movies and my friends' music inspire me lots!

What is your most memorable musical experience?
　Touring in Europe this year from March to April was soo great! I met many nice people! Love them and love the experience! Sometimes I was on radio programs... my english was terrible... but it was fun!

What are your favourite three songs at the moment?
　I've recently listened to this song again and again... my heart feels pain and beauty... so great!
　Daughter - "Still"
　And I like to listen to this album in the night. So chill... love his voice.
　Sam Amidon - "Bright Sunny South"

Who do you most admire in the music world?
　Boards of Canada.
　Love their sounds always.

In your opinion, what is the future of music?
　People love music in any situation, so music will keep alive and music lovers will protect music, I think. Me as well.

What's the future of your music - what do you hope to do next?
　Next, I want to do collaboration work with someone, but I don't know who yet...
　I want to make some up-beat songs now.

What, aside from music, is most important to you?
Manga!

---

---

The romanticism of creating what is essentially art, if we can assume that music is art, as a reaction to or a cure for our emotions is not dead, it seems. For Cuushe - real name Mayuko Hitotsuyanagi - her dreamy style tells of nights beset with different emotions, like the contemporary musical version of a poet writing in ink by candlelight. Her music is fragile and delicate, thin and hushed, so as not to disturb you too much - it's not the kind of music you party to, let's say that much.

However, the prospect of a collaboration by Cuushe with somebody (who will it be? It's a secret to everybody, including Cuushe herself) in order to create some "up-beat" songs is a rather a happy prospect. Whether it will be similar to her current style of music, one injected with the dreams and hush of night, or if it will change completely is something that we'll have to wait to see. I would definitely be up for hearing a different side to Cuushe, though, maybe one that leans towards the "pop" side of dream pop - something different is always nice, isn't it?

---

---

← #14: THE ORWELLS #16: ARISTOPHANES 貍貓 →

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Like Cuushe on Facebook
Listen to Cuushe on Soundcloud
Visit Cuushe's official site

CUUSHE BUTTERFLY CASE LP

This second half of this year has been dominated by the news of Cuushe's upcoming new album (or LP as I've anomalously called it in the title), Butterfly Case, and all that went with it, including sneak previews of how the album would sound thanks to a steady stream of songs uploaded from it. It's always been shaping up to be a rather beautiful-sounding collection of sounds and now the time is upon us. It's out, officially, today. It's been available to stream for a few days, but if you wanna own that album physically - and you're not from Japan - you can order that today. Literally.

My first contact with Cuushe, the Kyoto-born trackmaker, was when I wrote about an updated version of her song 'Airy Me' - from her debut album Red Rocket Telepathy - and the stunning hand-drawn animation that went with it. I've been intrigued since then, but luckily I haven't had to wait very long. For long-time Cuushe fans, however, it's been a long time in the making; Butterfly Case comes four years after her debut, and more than a year after 2012's EP, Girl You Know That I Am Here But The Dream.

However I am happy to report that anybody, fans and newcomers to the music, will be heartily pleased by this dreamworld of sounds that Cuushe has lovingly conjured. It is a blanket of close and comforting sounds that, with the very first sounds, envelops you, takes hold of you. Those first sounds come from 'Sort Of Light', an up-tempo number that soars above the clouds in a post-Balearic kinda euphoria. It encompasses, in general, a dreamy pop sound that is employed with catchy aptitude across the album. For instance, Cuushe's vocals are at their catchiest in 'Butterfly' (you should check out Kidsuke's remix), an uplifting number with a fluttering, kinetic beat, vital bass - almost as if its breathing - decorated with with synth leads that scream their existence in between the chugging rhythm chords. 'I Love You' is a pop song whose edges are undefined, whose sounds bleed indulgently into each other, but whose heart remains the same; an overflow of noise in the chorus here perfectly illustrates the strong emotions that dwell in love.

And shining out as a lovesong, but of the sad variety, is 'I Miss You' - there are wonderful percussion clicks here, giving the beat an understated vibe as the emotion of the song takes over, helped by a slo-house feel mixed with Cuushe's beautiful imploring voice. It's almost an obvious fact about the beauty of her voice, but it really is lovely: in 'Lost My Way' she could almost be crying out for guidance, whereas her voice seems telepathically sent from a dream in 'Twilight' (which I wrote about in more detail last month). At times her voice is as much an instrument as anything else, in 'Steamy Mirror' it weaves in and out of the crackling ambience, the ghostly synth, the blur of sounds.

There can be drama in Cuushe's songs, not just beauty. Although, a well-executed sense of drama - flawless dynamism - is kind of beautiful in itself. 'Twilight', for example, starts slow and humble, but ends as an near-overwhelming cascade of frantic synth and percussion. However, something like 'Swing Your Heart' is all drama: a subtle beat fizzes almost as if it's battling against torrents of rain, the rise and fall of the free-spirit guitars and synths crowd the heart and mind with a beautiful kind of melancholy feeling, and the quasi-anthemic chorus of "Swing your heart…" just leaks emotion. 'I Dreamt About Silence' exalts in a celebration of sound, a swaying field of synth - that gladness you get when you wake up and realise the dream was just a dream. Piano blusters and drums fizz; the build up later in the song, dropping with the resurrection of its icicle-like synths, is stunning.

Even the slow closer, 'Hanabi' ("fireworks" in Japanese), emulates the slow spectacle of a fireworks show, heavy echo on all parts of the percussion giving the sense of many staggering bursts of colour. But there is quiet here, too. Ambient quietude can be found all over the album. In some cases it is almost a sad sense of quiet and stillness, as in delicate 'Lost My Way', with its ever-so-slightly unnerving ambient noises, like frost glistening on the branches of trees, and its beatless nature conjuring the feeling of being lost. And in 'Hanabi', although there's the magic of seeing fireworks for the first time, there is the feeling of empty disappointment that arrives when the show's over. At other times it's not so gloomy, however, like the warm, homely feeling towards the end of 'Steamy Mirror'.

All in all it's one of those albums you put on, listen to all the way through, and sit there afterwards in a daze, like waking up from a dream. I listened to this in the car today and thought that it sounded as if we were travelling in a dream-like bubble, the grey day outside passing us like a faraway blur. And also I now understand the title, Butterfly Case. It's a place where dead butterflies are pinned and look beautiful, despite not moving or being alive anymore. And that's the case (no pun intended) with Cuushe's album; she's taken her emotions, that were vibrant, moving, mutating, and pinned them down in her own butterfly case. Although the very moment of feeling these things is not alive anymore, they have been preserved here beautifully.

It's out now on flau. Get it.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Like Cuushe on Facebook
Listen to Cuushe on Soundcloud
Visit Cuushe's official site