RE the art of the drop:
Botany’s new album, Raw Light II, starts much as you’d expect — with 2:38 of dusty, heady, extraterrestrial loops that swirl around the mind, flash-dancing in the dark like neuron firelight. Without giving too much away, there are very few drums, all of which come at the very end of the track and bounce right into the opening hit of song two, “Crowd Nothings.” Premiering below, it essentially functions as the album’s drop — the moment when the selector, having built audience anticipation to a captivating crescendo, finally lets the record spin of its own accord.
The placement, timing, and impact of this particular drop forces one to wonder about its implications. If this long play is itself a composition that has its first drop at the start of the second song, and if that song is one of the hardest hitting we’ve ever heard from Botany, then perhaps this is the first true drop of his entire catalog, and everything leading to it is just buildup. None of this feels all that far-fetched considering that Raw Light II is intended as the followup to Botany’s 2015 project, Dimming Awe: The Light Is Raw, which will be reissued on vinyl the same day that RLII drops digitally. Let’s also not forget that Botany has played with the delayed drop before, as on his remix of Lymbyc System’s “Opposing Bodies.”
Despite what crowds may gather, some artists in their heart of hearts always only perform for an audience of one or a select few. To them, even the most cogent critique is reduced to the mumbles of Charlie Brown’s teacher when compared with the heavy drop of a hard break.
Raw Light II will be available as a free download with the flamingo-pink vinyl reissue of Dimming Awe: The Light Is Raw, limited to 500 copies and dropping January 20 on Western Vinyl.
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