We’re glad to announce that London, United Kingdom-based psychedelic rock band The Oscillation have released a new album, entitled Untold Futures.
Veering between krautrock edginess, droning medicated tones, and noise-driven no-wave fuzz, The Oscillation recalls the music of Neu!, Tangerine Dream, and Loop interpreted with an eye on PiL’s dubbed out punk funk, Miles Davis’ experimentalism and Spacemen 3’s strung out blues-rock. Beginning in 2007, when DC Recordings released their debut album Out Of Phase, The Oscillation have released many subsequent albums and EPs, both self-released and with labels (Fuzz Club, Hands In The Dark, and Cardinal Fuzz). Recent releases include the mutant kosmiche techno of U.E.F and the pounding, otherworldly Wasted Space from 2018, as well as the epic exploration of the inner landscapes with Droneweapon. The Oscillation have also received radio play on BBC Radio 6, featured by presenters such as Stuart Maconie’s Freakzone, Lauren Laverne, Tom Ravenscroft Recommends, and Gideon Coe.
Now The Oscillation have returned with their latest album, Untold Futures, which questions our strange relationship with reality. The Oscillation’s continuing journey into the center of the mind and beyond shows absolutely no signs of slowing down. Untold Futures is less a consolidation of all that we’ve come to love and expect from the cosmic explorers, and is more of a leap forward into an upcoming reality. Redefining the possibilities of altered states through audio stimulation, the album finds The Oscillation at their most daring and breathtaking.
A multi-layered assault on the senses, this is an unexpurgated experience for the seasoned connoisseur and unspoiled novice alike. Its power is felt in the multi-layered dissonance and undying throb of “Dilated Mind,” the metaphysical possibilities that beat at the heart of metronomic pulses of “Forever Knowing” and the face-melting attack of “The Inner Void.” “Heart Of Nowhere” is a mantra for the profane, while the dissonant beauty of “Obscured” realises re-birth and resurrection. Revelatory in its brilliance and an intersection between the individual self and the collective unconscious, this is music to fuel the inner technology of the mind.
Accompanying the album’s release is a powerful VR immersive video by Julian Hand for the track “The Inner Void,” which you can check out here:
Untold Futures opens with “Dilated Mind,” which begins with hypnotic layers of synths and haunting, voice-like echoes, while the distant beat of a drum and fuzzy guitar textures soon fade in, leading into the track’s bass-driven, krautrock-inflected passages. Swirling guitar melodies are punctuated at intervals by shattering synth effects, and are later joined by echoing, hushed vocals, functioning synergistically to sustain a lysergic, otherworldly effect. As the guitars fade out towards the end, a droning synth nicely concludes the track and leads into “Forever Knowing.” The second track is introduced by futuristic-sounding, spacelike synth sequences and an icy, repeating guitar motif driven by steady, motorik drumming, while the vocals echo distantly; the tempo then increases midway through the track, as propulsive bass rhythms take over and effects-laden guitars filter into the mix, further potentiating the track’s entrancing atmosphere.
As the final fuzzed-out guitar notes fade at the end of “Forever Knowing,” oscillating synths veer in and out of focus to introduce the next track. “The Inner Void” is characterized by distorted, wah-drenched electric guitar leads that sear amidst a grooving bassline and hypnotic rhythms, while washed-out vocals slip beneath the layers of guitars and synths, adding nicely to its dark, druggy feel. “Heart of Nowhere” then starts with the chiming of a bell, whose echoes ingeniously morph into droning patterns of feedback. Deep, reverberating bass notes soon join in, accompanied by organic drumming and increasingly amplified, oscillating synth drones, whose complex layers of space-like textures are punctuated by crashing cymbals. Midway through, the bass subsides and a range of otherworldly synth effects are complemented by distorted chimes, their descending notes eventually fading into an eerie drone accompanied by rustling sounds that conjure visions of alien landscapes.
The concluding drones of “Heart of Nowhere” lead nicely into “Obscured,” where they are soon joined by haunting guitar melodies and powerfully dynamic, mid-tempo drumming that sets the track into a catchy groove along with a driving bassline. Searing fuzztone guitars and calm, distant vocals alternately color the sonic tapestry that is “Obscured,” while a range of distorted effects weave in and out of the track. As the layers of distortion intensify with ensuing chaos towards the end, the groove is indeed “obscured,” receding into walls of feedback and washes of cymbals in resolution. The album then closes with “Dilated Mind (ambient),” which is characterized by atmospheric drones interspersed with shattering synth effects, while echoing voice-like notes and distorted textures further sustain a pleasantly ethereal yet dissonant effect throughout.
While the individual tracks in The Oscillation’s latest album are impressive works of psychedelic music in their own rights, Untold Futures is all the more impressive considering how well the album flows together from beginning to end. And at the same time that The Oscillation build upon elements of recognizable musical styles such as shoegaze, psychedelic-, space- and krautrock throughout Untold Futures, the evocative soundscapes that they create reflect a sound that is wonderfully and uniquely their own.
Don’t forget to support The Oscillation on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, SoundCloud, YouTube, and Spotify. You can also check out their official website. If you enjoy their music and are able to provide monetary support, you might consider downloading it on Bandcamp; for virtual concerts you can go to songkick “Live from their sofa to yours”.
Be sure to stream and share The Oscillation’s music; you can obviously find it in the following Playlists: Fresh Singles, Alterindie State Of Mind, Long, Long, Long Songs, and Sickest & Dopest.
P.S. If you enjoy discovering new artists and fresh new music you can subscribe to this blog Less Than 1,000 Followers and follow the Playlist with all the artists that we have presented here!
This coverage was created via Musosoup #Sustainablecurator