Author Archives: Jammo

Review: Bell Curve – Snake in the Grass

Bell Curve in a dance pose. The Cover of Snake in the Grass by Bell Curve.

Read Time: 2 mins

Label //  Raspberry Rhythms
Released // 26/02/2025

I picked up this release a couple of weeks back, and it’s right up my Straße—dystopian, dub-laced, and heavy on the grime soundscapes.

The title track opens with serpentine rattles, snare rolls, tom hits, and lots of space—a mystical soundcheck, perhaps—laying the foundation of the rhythm for nigh on a minute. As the pads come in, the rhythm begins to take shape—complex, circular patterns that repeat like some mechanical mantra, while ghostly pads and grumbling, breathy drones loom above.

On Stop (Call Mi Phone), things switch up—gone are the mystical elements; now it’s spacious, minimal dancehall. Stop (Call Mi Phone) has a touch of the Peanie Peanie riddim about it—not in structure, but in aura—carrying the same airy, minimalist texture as Ward 21’s Petrol. It’s sexier, though, like Timbaland at his best. ‘Switzerland’s dancehall queen’ Lateena takes on toasting duties, telling an ex-lover, “I’m cryin’ in the rain, boy, but it’s not over you. No call mi phone, boy, leave me alone,” before chatting about the new man’s bedroom skills—it’s enough to make me blush. The vocal treatment is odd—which I love—some strange modulation that I can’t quite place. It’s as if it were recorded on a phone, lending the narrative a sense of authenticity.

Bell Curve closes with Pitch and Whine, a short but sweet masterclass in classic-sounding PS2 halcyon grime. It’s raw, stripped-back and visceral—delayed 808 cowbells, kicks almost entirely disposed of in favour of puncturing bass hits and robotic melodies, ice-laden and sparkling through the haze.

For more musings, music and middle-aged leftist rants, subscribe to our monthly updates.


Review: Vesper

Vesper and her father's drone look from behind a wall. From the film Vesper

Read Time: 4 mins

Film: Vesper (2022)
Directors: Kristina Buožytė, Bruno Samper
Starring: Raffiella Chapman, Richard Brake, Eddie Marsan, Rosy McEwen
Soundtrack: Dan Levy
Genre: Sci-Fi, Dystopian

Anyone who knows me knows that I’ve got a soft spot for dystopian sci-fi, especially the biology-inspired subgenre. Bonus points if it looks utterly dismal and/or is set in some desolate Eastern European landscape (it must be growing up during the Cold War). With that in mind, I turn to the 2022 Lithuanian-French-Belgian film Vesper.

Directed by Kristina Buožytė and Bruno Samper, the film takes place in a seemingly not-too-distant future (at least, it feels that way at the moment), in a world where crops have been depleted and society has broken down. The classic dystopian tropes of the haves and have-nots play out in a clash of parallel worlds. The lower classes, who are essentially living in semi-medieval conditions, toil in the mud for seeds and wreckage, while the oligarchy (largely unseen) inhabit the citadels—encapsulated cities that resemble giant octopuses—which are only ever seen from afar.

The story follows Vesper (Raffiella Chapman), a 14-year-old girl with a gift for biohacking. She lives with her father, Darius (Richard Brake), who is confined to his bed, paralysed after a war injury. We are told that Vesper’s mother ran away to join the Pilgrims, a mysterious group of veiled figures who silently scavenge in the post-apocalyptic no man’s land that is their world. Though bedridden, Darius uses a drone with a childish drawing of a face daubed onto it as a proxy for his body, allowing him to travel with and protect Vesper. I particularly liked the juxtaposition of high-tech elements, such as Darius’ drone, with the rough cabin where they dwell. The daubed face is a touch of brilliance, giving the floating orb a sense of personality and playfulness, reminiscent of dodgy 60s/70s British sci-fi productions.

Vesper holds her hands up to a flower like lifeform.
Vespers creations

Darius’ brother, Jonas (Eddie Marsan), lives nearby on some kind of farm. It’s never clearly stated, but it seems Jonas has either fathered a good number of children or is running some kind of children’s home. Either way, his role is that of a crooked exploiter, selling “his children’s” (as he calls them) blood to the people of the citadel. It’s never explained why, but I enjoyed the vampiric subtext—the rich quite literally sucking the blood of the poor. In a world where millionaire biohackers like Bryan Johnson infuse their own children’s blood, it cuts pretty close to the bone. Jonas is also in possession of citadel creatures known as Jugs—strange, pale, genetically engineered humanoids who are essentially slaves, programmed to follow orders. There’s a harrowing scene in which one of Jonas’ ‘children’ is strong-armed into killing a Jug, or “put it out of its misery,” as Jonas coldly puts it.

The technology is all more or less biological in either appearance or structure: power comes from a gooey black liquid described as bacteria. Though the outside of the drone is metallic and spherical, the interior is slimy and brain-like, as we see when Jonas sabotages his brother’s drone.

Things take a turn when a citadel plane crashes near the shack. In a strangely beautiful and serene scene, Vesper discovers the half-dead body of Camellia (Rosy McEwen) being fed on by various plant/insect lifeforms. Vesper rescues Camellia, who has been separated in the crash from her father, Elias, and brings her home—much to Darius’ discontent.

Vesper looks down at the body of a crash victim.
Vester finds Camellia

Vesper dreams of working in a lab in the citadel, to which her father warns, “You don’t know the cost of dreams.” She wants to help Camellia return to the citadel and hopes that she will take her and her father with her.

As with all good sci-fi, class war is at the root of Vesper. There is a sense that the people of the citadel are inhuman, cruel, and vampiric—slavers who have depleted the crops, torn the land apart, and toxified it with genetically modified organisms. It is they who hoard the wealth (seeds, in this case, which are codified) away from the people on the ground. And, of course, it is Vesper who is tasked with restoring the balance.

The world-building in Vesper is second to none, and the plant life is especially well-designed. The soundtrack by Dan Levy is excellent too, though I can’t say the final track was my cup of tea.

For more musings, music and middle-aged leftist rants, subscribe to our monthly updates.


Review: Masayoshi Fujita – Migratory

Cover of Migratory by Masayoshi Fujita. Text on an abstract image of red clouds.

Read Time: 3 mins

Label // Erased Tapes
Released // 06/09/2024

Masayoshi Fujita follows up 2021’s Bird Ambience with the aptly named Migratory.

Recorded at Fujita’s Kebi Bird Studio in the coastal mountains of Kami-cho, Migratory opens with “Tower of Cloud”. Brimming with melancholy and romance, it evokes memories of more thematic music by Sabres of Paradise and Angelo Badalamenti. The laggard square bass sequence – delayed and reverb-soaked – provides a rigid skeleton for Fujita’s marimba flourishes and white-noise, staccato synth vamps to dance around. Although relatively light and airy, it becomes subtly discordant as it introduces long, oscillating synth pads, taking you into a far tenser headspace.

“Pale Purple” begins with piercing shō notes and low drones (perhaps an organ?) that loop in sequence, punctuated by marimba and vibraphone parts – a spell at dawn, the sound of mountains waking up. Something about “Blue Rock Thrush” reminds me of Wagner’s “Das Rheingold: Prelude”. It’s not the music, though – it’s the structure, the slow birth of something elemental. With its lulling vibrato sax circling, it’s almost spiritual, and it sends me flying.

“Our Mother’s Lights” features guest vocals from the inimitable Moor Mother, dripping words like honey over Fujita’s dreamlike marimba arpeggios and a sax lead reminiscent of the great Yasuaki Shimizu. As Moor Mother says: “We are just travelling through open space, in the darkness of our mother’s light”. “Desonata” has a meditative quality. A repeated, filtered synthesiser sequence, the vibraphone long and majestic, soaring like some cosmic bird, juxtaposed against the marimba, earthly and sassy, like a cat at play. This same feeling continues in “Ocean Flow”, though far less cosmic, where seabirds and subtle tidal tones wash in and out of the sound picture.

“Distant Planet” paints a far more minimalist picture; the marimba takes centre stage here, innocent and stripped bare, its melody almost childlike – in awe of something else, something greater. As the synthesiser comes in halfway through, you get the sense of a conversation being had. It’s as if a child, looking up at the stars in wonder, poses a question through the marimba while the synthesisers provide the answer from somewhere out there.

The sax and shō return on “In a Sunny Meadow”, and it’s heartbreakingly beautiful; the dulcet saxophones blend exquisitely with the shrill tone of the shō. “Higurashi” features the hauntingly beautiful vocals of Hatis Noit over a bed of what sounds like cicadas (perhaps synthesisers) and light marimbas. I won’t lie – I shed a tear on this one.

More delicate soundscapes appear on “Valley”, where vibraphones and drones float over distant winds. The album closes with “Yodaka” – which, according to Google Translate, means nighthawk. Whether correct or not, it certainly sounds like it. Drones and the shō create a sense of drama – a dark incantation to the moon – gradually relaxed by the marimba and vibraphone parts, which counterpoint the darker tones. It encompasses so much of what I love about this album: the interplay of dark and light, the mystery and the beauty of the mountains and the coast. It makes me homesick; it’s wild, romantic and honest. I’ve never been to Kami-cho, but I’ve been to Ceredigion, and I know there’s magic in them hills.

For more musings, music and middle-aged leftist rants, subscribe to our monthly updates.