Few like Brian Leeds have been able to deconstruct the soul and morphology of electronica as we (re)know it. In a populous and ever-emerging fauna of producers willing to advance contemporary music in other quadrants, the American has already achieved a deep admiration for those who follow this path. Over a decade, he has demonstrated possible oblique paths for understanding, listening to, and developing dance music – in a purposely vague sense. Colonial Patterns was the first installation by Huerco S. A sonic labyrinth in which echoes of techno cohabit in a sound collage of static, reverb, and distant memories. The bravery of a debut of this calibre immediately gave Leeds the idea that they knew what they were getting into.
Three years later, For Those Of You Have Never (And Also Those Who Have) fell into our hands like something from another world. It’s a genuine opus that has yet to be mapped out. Practically beatless, yet pulsating like an entity with a life of its own, it scratches the surface of ambient music until you feel the roughness that is omnipresent on their discs. Pendant, Loidis, and Royal Crown of Sweden are other heteronyms that, alongside Leeds, sign an extensive and impressive body of work still being written.
The third and new life of Huerco S. takes us back to terra incognita. Plonk is an exoplanet inhabited by metallic percussions and melting synthesizers in an inexhaustible flow of possibilities. His abstract gaze continues to discover the less obvious as an engine for rhythmic and melodic mutations that settle into a state of pure sonic architecture.
His return to ZDB is a highlight. It is relevant for the presentation of one of the discs of the year and essential for the opportunity to catch one of the most brilliant examples of music that urgently needs to be heard right now. NA
