Malibu Locals Only

Matterhorn pt 2

Malibu Locals Only isn't a new moniker from Sean M. Petell, just a reactivation of the guise he used to release a collection of New Age tracks earlier this year on the lovely Politesse split We Rusticated Earth. Others tracks from this period, best found here and on the 2012 Living Room Visions compilation which also features MJ Linckoln's Doug Prishpreed (titled after a sports reporter), weren't tied to a dedicated MLO album or EP but seemed to trickle out over a 4 month period.

Only one track has reappeared on MLO's debut-proper on Sunup Recordings, the sublime and dreamy Sunday Drive into Sunset, opening with clip-clop horse hooves and fireside guitar that degenerates into serene drones which chime and unfold gradually, more like descending bliss than the forward motion of motor travel, when sleeps begins to drip-drip itself over your eyes and the flames settle to dozy embers.  

The tape opens with a masterful 11-minute suite, Nayru; Farore, Din a dusky, crackling keyboard drift set across gently rattling tins or pans that calmly circle the implied campfire. This arrangement, keyboards over found or concrete layers (usually water trickling/running, the shuffling of people, crackles), forms the backbone of the album with the playing endearingly patchy -the enjoyment of the player and the value of the task is evident, even if their hands pause or miss the odd note.

This is the key element that I spoke of/looked forward to in my earlier post about vaporwave artists developing: actual playing. Who'd have though it? Real instruments and musicianship isn't really my thing (I sympathise with OF's Jasper when he says "...rapping's stupid and it's hard"), I can live without them and am rarely impressed by virtuosity -give me a well-programmed piece of electronic music any day; skill's overrated.
However, here, the conceptual message (implied my Petell and inferred, correctly or otherwise, by me) is that the found-sound/ready-made collage/cut-up/loop of eccojams, vaporwave compositions has run its course. Aesthetic lessons have been learned, audiences garnered and collectives formed, but now this progress needs to be harnessed and deployed rather than allowed to drift endlessly (and fruitlessly) on like, well, an eccojam. 

Matterhorn pt 2 has something playfully real about it, whether it's the choo-choo and clatter of a train that opens and trundles throughout Albert Rosenfield or the aforementioned environmental elemental soundscapes, this recording appears to reject the Second Life, pre-rendered Internet artificiality that was/is so fetishised in vaporwave. Refreshingly so, too, as real flesh and blood playing has never felt so welcome to me; this is the webwave equivalent of going acoustic, of switching off the wi-fi for the night.

I'm persevering with my webwave tag, by the way, because it allows me to keep track of a bundle of developments that shared some origins or overlaps at one point, be it Seapunk, Eccojam, vaporwave, distroid (arf!) or the Hypnogogic Pop and New Age revivals of last year.

Overall, Matterhorn pt 2 isn't the most exciting release from Petell but is an important palette cleanser, a vital road sign forward for an artist whose grip of musical concepts isn't bound by style, genre or even tools used. Whereas we've become insulated and acclimatised to the schmaltzy-cheese that's gleefully (even perversely) referenced/deployed by many webwave artists (New Dreams Ltd, Uncle Dan Lopatin and Mr Ferraro chiefly responsible), this release is easier on the noise-fan's ear on account of the concrete backdrop, fewer excuses needed for passers-by or family members ("...why're you listening to this? I thought you were into weird music..."), while retaining more authentic versions of the emotions and atmospheres these New Age and Muzaks of old were only able to artificially imply.

A very successful release and worth your time (and $! Get the tape!).