Bleep

An Era Of Spiritual Tenebrae

Much like the digitally distended dogs that adorn its cover, An Era Of Spiritual Tenebrae makes for an uneasy, yet oddly friendly companion across its two longform tracks.

Tenebrae marks the second release from Our Souls Are In The Hands Of The Translator, the latest moniker in Chicago producer Jamal Moss’s wildly prolific arsenal. Where his long standing Hieroglyphic Being project already stretches the experimental limits of dance music into a gleeful putty, Our Souls Are In The Hands Of The Translator feels more connected to Moss’s known stance as a Sun Ra disciple in its meditatively freeform approach. The project’s debut, 2018’s sɪŋkrɪtɪzəm, pulled hypnotic loops out of blown out house and techno tracks, but Tenebrae drives Moss’s formula further by creating a cosmic meeting place between jazz, ambient drone, and dance music across its twin 18-minute compositions.

"Continue to see yourself shining your light, brighter and brighter with every breath out,” he instructs in a mantra exercise alongside the album’s notes. “May love heal our world. May we all choose kindness and compassion."

With Tenebrae referencing a Christian service around Easter, Moss’s aim here is on earthbound spiritual healing, even if its sound is positively alien. ‘Magna Controversia’ centers around a mechanical loop as Moss twists and pulls techno transmissions into its orbit, while ‘Quomodo Erit Finis’ takes its time amidst the glitches to assemble into a groove. Ultimately, there is something meditative in The Translator’s slow-building approach, but Tenebrae is undeniably healing music that embodies the restless, digitally distorted world it’s trying to soothe.

sɪŋkrɪtɪzəm

Our Souls Are In The Hands Of The Translator presents his Arcola debut, sɪŋkrɪtɪzəm. A two tracker of Chi-Town acid that offers a mouthful of Mathematics from Jamal Moss, the legendary producer and DJ who has worked with everyone from Adonis to Wolf Eyes.

Following the relaunch of Arcola earlier this year with Rian Treanor's grime shocka Contraposition EP and quickly followed by 2814's rainfall techno 12" and Nkisi's battering ram gabba orchestra, sɪŋkrɪtɪzəm seemingly ties together all that has come before it while transmitting it through some solid wax and into two fuzzy-edged 8am techno jammmz.

Impoverished Spirits slowly meanders around a carefully building arpeggio and some starlight synth structures before being steamrolled into a thumping acid track that comes with a bonus round near perfect ambient breakdown midway through. This one will fittingly crush any bleary-eyed dancers and demands to be played at a suitably high level volume.

While on the other side of midnight, Bilal takes things down a step or 2 with a more laid-back feel to the dilated pupil drones, a bubbling LFO bassline repeatedly surfaces like some sort of mad techno submarine before dipping back down below, leaving the keys flowing inward like smoke drifting through the side door of your favourite rave.