Glassmaps conjures a balance of yin and yang, with his track My head my heart.
GLASSMAPS is a curious name for an artist. A map made of glass would surely offer no aid to a lost traveller; the glare alone would be problematic at best. And much like his namesake, creator of the project Glassmaps, Josh Stein’s latest single casts up unifying contradictions.
An 8bit drone of synth chords lines the floor of a hospital waiting room, when the track known as My head my heart begins. Notes string themselves out from the Australian guitarists’ electronic hands, dipping into the sound of artificial trepidation as they mix with the weary kicks of drum beats.
Stein shuffles away from his days as a main player in indie rock band Howling Bells, grasping whole heartedly at crumbling distortion but decorating it with an eerie programmed synthesis instead of his usual guitar based glory.
His humming vocals capture the nuance of a hospital waiting room – the place of the track’s conception, with brittle pixels of overdrive. Each of the gravelly vocal notes seem to dissolve into their twinned synthesiser note. Each droning chord is treated with a gritty DIY production that feels as though it’s been picked up from the song’s birth place, and dropped off in a studio to grow up. If Stein were to record his conjuring of uneasy drones and ominous electricity just as his amp blew over, it wouldn’t sound any different to the overarching production of this track.
And yet, as the track’s chorus approaches, hope streams through the otherwise dimly lit room. Airy chords that string out their own line of pretty melodies, find themselves immersed in red lining falsetto from Stein’s now desperately hopeful vocals. Steampunk rock reminiscent of Royal blood or Cage the elephant, bursts out from the climbing voice, offering the light yang to the previously overcast yin of ominous sounds.
Stein paints a burnt out hospital room of desperate victims and hopeful loved ones, with his juxtaposition of threatening pitch black verses and encouraging chorus in this track. He seems to find a refreshing sort of balance in the volatility of bleak melancholic drones and sanguine vocal cries, offering us emotional contrast through electronic devices.
I wonder if the rest of the artist’s album can juggle this oxymoronic twist on synthesised odes.
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