Black Flower
Kinetic - an exploration of liberation through movement
(Sdban Records)
Kinetic:
A big inspiration for this album was Bwiti music. At least for a few tracks. We wanted to make a groovy album that would make people dance. Bwiti is not really a style of music but rather a religion in Cameroun, Gabon, and Congo where villages come together for several days to go in trance and that’s accompanied by this Bwiti music. Very fast tempos and light percussion. The tempo is so high that it doesn’t allow for many low sounding percussions or it gets too messy in the low frequencies. Instead they use a lot of higher pitched and rather small percussions that can take on very high tempos. The speed is a trance on its own. We didn’t copy any style, any particular groove or composition, it’s more the concept of Bwiti music that was an inspiration for us. At around the second minute there is this keyboard thingie repeating. We were teasing Karel during the mixing of this tune to always pretend that it was a ringtone and we would pick up our phone faking being confused about it.
Monkey system:
The vibe of this one is reminiscent of the psychedelic cumbia tunes like the ones from Meridian Brothers, Los Pirañas,… Monkey system isn’t cumbia at all, but somehow it makes me think of it: a straightforward pumping groove with lots of spacey ingredients on top.
Underwave:
The whole tune was built up around the heavy keys (farfisa organ with effect pedals). Karel found this sound during our 4 day retreat in the Ardennes when we were jamming the first ideas of the album together. His amp was blasting and we were all stoked about it. It’s gonna blast live on stage as well I’m sure.
Synesthetic:
This tune we almost entirely improvised in one take during those jams in the Ardennes. We didn’t change that much from the very first ideas. We only gave it a structure that helps the energy flow from beginning to end and added some chords in the bridge, that’s it. Life can be simple.
Check the gorgeous video clip!
Conundrums:
This track was inspired by Richie Hawtin’s Consumed album. I love that so much and listened to it for many months. Actually Simon (the drummer) showed me this album, so we had to make a track that was inspired by this. We love how a simple beat in 4/4 can be made very trance-y by adding polyrhythms on top in 3 or 5 while still keeping the 4/4 beat holding everything together.
Particles:
Another bwiti inspired track to finish the album seemed appropriate :)
Essential Information: 'Kinetic' is available on vinyl, CD, and download/stream on Sdban Records.
