Bleep

Supernatural forces rarely communicate to us in intelligible ways. David Toop seems to recognise this, transporting us to a mysterious, liminal otherworld on Pink Spirit, Noir World.

Following on from their reissue of Ultramarine’s pan-genre 1990 album Folk, London-based reissue label Foam On A Wave present the second release in their catalogue, compiling tracks from Toop’s 1996 and 1997 albums Pink Noir and Spirit World. The set has been compiled for 2022 and remastered by longtime collaborator Dave Hunt - Pink Spirit, Noir World finds David Toop and a global entourage of musicians moving through damp caves of downtempo folk rhythms and hypnagogic sound collages.

Though many tracks find themselves in a tense and foreboding atmosphere, there is a profound optimism that comes with the musical interplay of diverse and often unrelated sounds. Toop dreams up a sociological sonic network, where his music becomes its own linguistic force. Unidentifiable sounds communicate with skittering percussion and chimes. Synthesisers are ancient folk instruments, calling out like dolphin whistles to radio wave cicadas. We, as listeners, observe these conversations, untranslatable if not for the hushed prose poetry uttered throughout, speaking of shamanic rituals and folkloric secrets.

On the 20 minute closing track ‘Spirits Shimmered Among the Live People’, a heart beats with limping gait to the elegant clockwork of an orchestral Rube Goldberg machine. Cultural artefacts and instruments from all continents come together, tapping into the primal state of a studio jam session. It’s communal music at its most esoteric, and an acknowledgement that life exists wherever you find yourself on planet Earth.