Profligate
Somewhere Else

THE REVIEW

There's something about this album that makes me think of literary works like "The Naked Lunch" or "Under the Volcano" by Malcolm Lowry: a sensation of complete estrangement from the surrounding reality and a vision of crazed images that follow each other in the mind in a sequence seemingly devoid of temporal sense and logic. Yet, when you piece together all these fragments, these slides, you eventually discover they form one grand plan that is man. The human race. Clearly, Noah Anthony (Night Burger, Social Junk, Form a Log), aka Profligate, with his latest LP ("Somewhere Else," Wharf Cat Records), does not exactly offer a solution to this puzzle, which can at best be interpreted with insight only by a science like psychoanalysis. However, much like a complex literary work laden with hallucinations both visual and abstract, here he offers seven compositions of minimal synthetic electronics considered as psychotic representations expressed in a cryptic and poetic manner, with visceral and deeply expressive vocal interpretations.

Very interesting, especially regarding the literary aspect and the writing of the lyrics, is the renewed collaboration with writer and author Elaine Kahn, who here is more than a collaborator but a full-time part of the project. In addition to writing, she also lends her vocal interpretation in tracks like "Enlist," "Black Plate," and "Needle In Your Lip"... It has to be said that her somewhat solemn and fatalistic interpretive style, almost glacial and essential, contrasts with a set of compositions still very akin to each other and in any case characterized by the typical dubstep and drum & bass formula accompanied by noise outbursts and synthetic techno trances and circular bass lines. This contrasts with Noah's expressive power, which fits perfectly into the artificial micro-world constructed by his compositions, reminiscent of the best moments of Jamie Stewart (without reaching that excessive Xiu Xiu pathos) or the electric ghosts of Freddy Ruppert aka Former Ghosts, up to the lessons of great masters like Gary Numan and John Foxx.

"Somewhere Else" is an album that seems cold on the surface, but the sensations transmitted in continuous flashes of visual images gradually acquire a certain sharpness and color until they are fully focused. For me, it's a delightful new discovery, which, with everyone's respective attitudes and respect for their differences, pairs well with the return of Matt Elliott aka The Third Eye Foundation, confirming the good moment for minimal synthetic music.