Witness K / S/T 12’’ Black Vinyl

Witness K / S/T 12’’ Black Vinyl

Cat #: e/n-074
FORMAT: 12’’ black vinyl LP 
LABEL: ever/never records
RELEASE DATE: March 3, 2023 

All the way from Sydney, ever/never records presents you with a masterpiece for our current  times. It has the aura of a great classic record, avant-garde meets melodic intensities and  contemporary poetry while inviting the listener to the urgent need for collective reflection.  A fantastic array of players with complex instrumentation offer us intricate narratives and  multilayered soundscapes: Maeve Parker (flute, poetry, xylophone, and keys), Lyn Heazlewood  (guitar, fan, vocals, and accordion) Sabina Rysnik (guitar, vocals, and keys), and Andrew  McLellan (bass, vocals, electronics, and piano). Marcus Whale lends saxophone on 'Fantasy in  Facsimile'. I was already incredibly excited about this record since Andrew McLellan's Cured  Pink album Current Climate (also published on CD by ever/never) is for me, one of the best  records of the last decade. Experimental no-wave dub as its best. The expectations have not only  been met but astoundingly exceeded.  

Witness K is a different affair altogether from Current Climate. Sparse but thoughtful.  Recitations punctuated by sparks of shoegaze interventions make the mood serene but with a  constantly menacing undercurrent. The compositions, the playing, and the production are  masterfully accomplished; clear, precise, and beautifully executed. Think if the Shadow Ring  finally play with their idols ZNR and together they invite Florence Shaw and Roland S. Howard  to do a non- commercial city pop record to be produced by Mica Levi. This album cuts through  the confusing digital entropic reality, in order to give you the necessary space to reflect while  wandering subtly through field recordings, poetry, and voices that take you to different situations  at the edge of memory and consciousness.  

There is a certain atemporality to this record. Or rather it puts you exactly at that moment where  history is breaking in two. As if you suddenly were in San Francisco in 1981, when Throbbing  Gristle were disintegrating but a new beginning was also being constructed. Between the end of  an era and the beginning of a new adventure. Captivating nostalgia for a past that you know you  just have to let pass and move forward. No need to panic. ASMR melodies whisper to you that  there is a future beyond our melting ground and that it is possible to crawl into the surface of a  ragged society so you can keep going and able to build something different, something better and  more honest. This is already marked in the name of the band which connects the dark  undercurrent that goes through the record and refers to one of the most turbulent geopolitical  Australian incidents in the last two decades. Witness K was a highly decorated ASIS officer  (Australia's overseas secret intelligence agency) who revealed that in 2004 during the  negotiations with East Timor for the extraction of oil and gas, the Australian secret service  bugged East Timor's government and president's office so they could have the upper hand during  the negations. This obviously resulted in an extremely bad deal with East Timor. Australia has  done everything possible to hide this case. 

Witness K is not about seeking discounted redemption, but showing that the ground is unstable,  that this disintegrating society also offers the possibility of constructing a better future. It gives  you the necessary warmth to acknowledge that the world is fucked but there is something that we  can do about it. The more you listen to it the more layers you discover and the more you get.  Opaque in the most positive way, this record is necessary. — Mattin (author of Social  Dissonance)

TRACKLIST: 
Seeking Discount Redemption
Reasonable Minds May Differ
How Do We Count Your Poses
Fantasy In Facsimile
In Knots
Scream Across The Low Fence
Thank You, Harold
I Wanted The Word Magnetism To Describe Their Relationship