A little over a year after the collaborative debut of Magic Fades (Jeremy Scott, Mike Grabarek) and Soul Ipsum (Wyatt Schaffner), they’re back with the second book, Zirconia Dynasty, out June 30 on Columbus, Ohio’s Apothecary Compositions. It’s the follow-up to Zirconia Reign, which saw a EUREKA! accolade, was dubbed “high-gloss smart-rave” in our review of Moon B’s killer Lifeworld, and was hailed as “how life FEELS in a post-digital world” by our Choco editor.
Thankfully, Zirconia Dynasty draws as much wake as its predecessor. Its first publicly-made songs — “Club Op” and “Anonymity Fetish” — each connect and distance Dynasty from Reign. Any space left after Zirconia Reign’s “XXtraclean” and “Top Flex Kush” are in the mix of club and command in “Club Op,” while “Anonymity Fetish” — featured in Druid Cloak’s On Deck THUMP mix — is Dynasty’s polished, bitcoin-operated piano bar, pure and fluid and down-pitched R&B.
The album’s last sneak peek before release is “Pangea LTD,” a track with drums and cheers like a super toned-down Breakfast Mountain song and the closest Sister, Sister to “Dumb Wrist .obj.” “Pangea LTD” is in the frontline of the Dynasty; the gloss isn’t gone, but their build-for-stadium-size-speakers/”prog inspired guitar work” holds the album in a brighter light. Like how Birkut in his R Plus Seven review connected Lopatin’s work on Replica to each other saying: “R Plus Seven doesn’t expose such a dramatic shift after all,” adding “[t]he most fascinating clues to its luscious textures and staggering harmonic sequences lie, quite expectedly, in the most unexpected places.” Zicornia Dynasty is smaller in terms of its sense of time and bigger in its sonic diversification, but similar because it was probably made through sessions fueled by kush, coffee, and tons of grapefruit-flavored LaCroix Sparkling Water.
Magic Fades and Soul Ipsum forever, y’all.
The uber-limited CD (50 copies, oversized print of PUSSYKREW’s cover art included) is up for pre-order right now on Apothecary Compositions’s Bandcamp. And P.S.: Apothecary Compositions is having a spring sale.
• Soul Ipsum: https://soundcloud.com/soul_ipsum
• Magic Fades: https://soundcloud.com/magicfades
• Apothecary Compositions: http://apothecary-compositions.com