- Motion Ward continues to grow with an earthy folk record from Ben Bondy and Mister Water Wet.
- The deeper Ben Bondy and Iggy Romeu get into their careers, the further they wander from the chillout music they were once known for. Kansas City-based Romeu got his start throwing parties and releasing dance tracks as Norrit in the late '00s. Recently, he's embraced unconventional sound collaging, jazz, and Americana as Mister Water Wet. Bondy found his footing in a sphere that orbits artists like Special Guest DJ and Purelink. Since 2020, he's asserted an impressive command over queasy, melodic IDM. Bondy and Romeu have teamed up for a project called Kevin, which slowly came to life over the course of three years. The duo's debut, Laundry, arrives via Motion Ward and is unlike anything the Los Angeles label has put out before. Bondy's bittersweet vocals drive the record, which feels as indebted to Alex G as Huerco S. It's rewarding to hear two leftfield electronic artists backtrack into comparably straightforward terrain, crafting weightless folk music.
This isn't Bondy's first foray into songwriting. On his 2022 dream pop album as crash830, he sang over hazy electric guitars and woozy drum machines. And late last year he put out an EP under the alias K2DJ, which presented a pastoral spin on cloud rap. Laundry is his most realized outing as a lyricist to date. "slow" is a desolate ode to hedonism, seemingly written in the thick of some Monday morning slump. "This song's about feeling / We're in the club / Like every weekend," Bondy sings over glitchy strings and muted chords in the opening lines. "staying" is wistful and dejected, guitar finger picking paired with a hefty dose of pessimism. "Heaven only makes it worse / Wait for me / Staying only makes it hurt," he croons in the final verse. "sum things (heal)" is the most delicate track on Laundry, Bondy's quiet voice resting atop barren acoustic chords and rustling effects. The proper songs on the record strike a sluggish yet wide-eyed tone that carries over onto Laundry's instrumental cuts.
"frog valley" is the LP's most pronounced detour for both Bondy and Romeu—in the vein of '90s post-rock bands like Hood and Bark Psychosis. "u know me" features Monogamy's Don Lyons and former Perfect Pussy keyboardist Shaun Sutkus, two musicians who came up in DIY rock scenes. The partnership is surprisingly comforting, with the healthy dose of reverb evoking the feeling of being wrapped in a cocoon. Ambient favorite Ulla appears on "selfish replacement" and "capsule curve," operating under the name foamy sax. On these two jazzy tracks, Ulla's distant woodwind flourishes call to mind flower petals landing on the surface of a pond. After toying with glitchy effects on her last full-length, Foam, her contributions offer a welcome return to the naturalism that underlined Ulla's earlier music.
Even when Bondy and Romeu stay close to their atmospheric roots, the echoes of '90s dub techno that typically course through their output are nowhere to be found. After churning out records geared towards 4 AM dissociation, it's humanizing to hear the duo create music for unclouded thinking. Laundry is organic and fuzzy, like a slowcore album melted down into sepia toned putty. The similarities between ethereal electronic music and shoegaze have never been hard to pinpoint—both genres tend to be murky and downtempo. On Laundry, the duo unites these styles with ease, emphasising the emotional range of a crew associated with long nights out.
Tracklist01. cloud cover
02. staying
03. selfish replacement feat. foamy sax
04. slow
05. frog valley
06. capsule curve feat. foamy sax
07. sum things (heal)
08. u know me feat. shaun n don
09. for the ones we love