“Conceived by Minneapolis musician and MJ MJ Records CEO Sasha Conda in collaboration with writer Patrick Scott-Walsh III, whose 24-page narrative accompanies the release, BRONCO maps its hero’s quest across a linear 7-song cycle of decadent casino fusion boogie, neon waterfall 2-step, sci-fi new wave, and spherical synthesizer dirge – fantasy-as-escape meets escape-as-fantasy.” - BB
Since 2008, Not Not Fun’s lineage of imagination in music has changed how I listen to releases. To be respectfully truthful, I can’t favor ALL releases in the label’s existence, but no matter WHAT, I’ve a specific story for each CS, CD or LP I’ve listened to in their discography. That being said, it was only a matter of time my dream has come true, and my boy Sasha Conda at MJ MJ Records fulfilled it. As stated, Sasha Conda garnered help from writer Patrick Scott-Walsh III — including cover art by Keith Rankin — for BRONCO’s birth on Earth tomorrow, popping-out in the form of pro-dubbed cassettes encased by “oversized cases” with a hand-assembled photocopied zine. NOW, an excerpt from the chapter, “IN THE DARK:”
If you’ve spent enough time in the Palace Interior you will notice the seeming gaps in its construction. Bronco’s self-generating mental map noticed these absences and was compelled (beyond his hair-trigger subconscious advocating for more drugs and carnal procedures). And he walked through the poly-chromatic light screens acting as false walls.
That hallway – the first breach, the transgression from consumer of the P.I. to user – is lit with soft, transitioning gradients. The nebulous features emphasizing potential and capability. You continue down the hall and it dissolves into a substantive place of ad-hoc store rooms, dishing out things and experiences that can’t be easily explained. Bronco finds his posture changing. His long, territorial strut turns to stalking, like some part of himself cannot be suppressed or put to ease. He wonders if he should worry, if he should be saying “no” to the anonymous force. But that would be doing something he hasn’t done since he decided on the components that make himself. The removal of the “yes / no’s” and the forging of his own hedonistic anti-code of “fuck yeah’s / hell no’s”.
Further ahead is a flickering emulation of a woven drape, bending and flailing, affected by the imaginary force of simulated wind. And beyond that shifting, luminous drape is a potential for self-dissolution – the limit-experience you couldn’t fathom through the weak expanse that is you.
Not only is BRONCO articulately intricate, pairing my love of reading and lyric-less music, but songs like “In The Dark” take scalings of notes, creating literal fluidity from writing to sound. As admitted to me by Sasha Conda, “The line ‘Bronco’s long territorial strut turns to a skulking’ is literally translated in the song as the key change that happens halfway through.” Pure. Love. And it’s more adventurous than scary, which helps, because I know it’s just the upcoming holiday making me mind play tricks on me, but right now, I’m sleeping in silence with a butcher knife by my bed. Now, “In The Dark” (having listened to the track on repeat for more than an hour) will be lodged in the node that makes me whistle, or whichever keeps songs stuck in my head. But until I grip the entire package, it’ll be the only taste I want, even if Not Not Fun sent me the digital album, BRONCO must be respected in its truest form, and I’m just dying to experience. SCOPE TOMORROW AT THE NOT NOT FUN STORE AND JAME ON “In The Dark” BELOW UNTIL THE PACKAGE ARRIVES!
• Sasha Conda: https://soundcloud.com/sashaconda
• Not Not Fun: http://www.notnotfun.com
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