Ummagma
Today sonic dream believers Ummagma released their anticipated LCD EP courtesy of Label Obscura/Somewherecold Records that presses forward toward outer reaches of expression & experience. Comprise of the core couple duo of Canada’s Shauna McLarnon & Ukraine’s Alexander Kretov, the two utilize fusions of technological telepathy & futurist dream arts to carry on creative dialogues that descend like space crafts from undiscovered cosmos. Their synergy takes off here on their most adventurous & immersive series of sounds yet, collaborating with heroes Robin Guthrie (of Cocteau Twins) & Dean Garcia (Curve, SPC ECO) to contribute new perspectives that allow the Ummagma’s sciences to be steered toward further enrichment by way of complimentary collaborations that formulate newly realized electric avenues.
LCD is Ummagma’s gift to the listeners by way of sending us all into hyperdrive across the astral plane. The title track buzzes, drifts, coasts & illuminates like the feeling of being securely sequestered at the helm of the controls. You can almost hear constellations of stars & planets soaring past, as the Dean Garcia SPC ECO mix of “LCD” slows the track down & channels the entire event into something heard in an epic film odyssey where the sci-fi fantasies spill forth from the dissonant dimensions & onto the pale blue dot’s cold hard ground in an escape pod. Robin Guthrie’s mix of “Lama” (the original version can be found off Ummagma’s debut album Antigravity) finds the Cocteau Twins legend providing a new remix lens for the timeless track where that familiar electric-ax is re-introduced into a beautiful harmony of like-minded aesthetes. The closing curtain call of “Back To You” (Dean Garcia SPC ECO Mix) fuses the post-industrial instincts with the ambient & understated currents that contribute to an atmosphere that echoes outward & onward into the autumn’s elusive mystic mist that holds up the celestial interstellar layers of spheres.
Ummagma’s Shauna McLarnon offered up the following exclusive reflections on the new EP:
Ummagma is a marriage in so many ways than legal matrimony. None of what we have created could have happened with anyone other than our lifelong partner in each other. As corny as it may sound, we are the ying and yang that round each other out and complete the circle that you find in every song we release. We do make a lot of stuff – you don’t hear it all. We release only the bits we feel to have come full circle. The same goes with our remixes. While we use to be rather loose in allowing people to remix our music, lately we are gravitating to certain artists who inspired us in the first place. From working with A.R.Kane on our ‘Winter Tale’ release earlier this year and now, with our new ‘LCD’ EP, putting our work in the hands of two other iconic artists, whose music we fell in love with in our youth and are still going strong (Dean Garcia of Curve/ SPC ECO and Robin Guthrie of Cocteau Twins), we have had the pleasure of being twisted and turned by the best artists we can possibly encounter in this lifetime.
We are so happy that all of these ground-breaking pioneers in the alternative music world have taken us under our wing, so to speak. Not only have they taken the time to listen to our music, spend time getting to know us and encouraged us with the musical direction we have been heading in, but so too have they given us (and listeners) something so much greater by collaborating with us to present their own spin on Ummagma tracks. Through this collaboration, we are, in effect, rounding out yet another circle—from our roots (found in their own original creations in the 1980s and 1990s) to our own musical beginnings in the early 2000s—through to this LCD EP, finally bringing it all together. Special thanks goes out to Dean, Robin and Rudy Tambala (of A.R.Kane) earlier this year for finding beauty in and re-shaping our music. Thank to everyone else for listening and much appreciation to those paying it forward.
Ummagma’s LCD EP is available now via Label Obscura/Somewherecold Records.
