Often reminiscent of a modernized and space-faring Tyrannosaurus Rex blent with a much more intelligent Laurie Anderson, a hugely tamed Kate Bush, and the odd streamer of Lucia Hwong or Clara Mondshine in their best moments, Danielle Stech-Homsy leans aesthetically into carefully crafted electronics for flavors not often set down. Atmosphere is everything in Rio en Medio's work, laying out three-dimensional environments in which mysterious unnameable somethings transit while dimensional warps birth strange flashing manifestations slicing through billows of mist, unaccountable sunlight glinting down from night skies.The songs here are unorthodox while sonorous, but some, like The Diamond Wall, have decidedly abrupt elements making them all the more interesting, bricolage properly set.unsettlingly indexed at moments but surprisingly appropriate. Frontier is definitely progressive fare, not of the elder standards but rather the new tone of labels like Language of Stone, Secret Eye, and etc. Venus of Willendorf even manages to incorporate glitch, a style, if that's the right term, that has been a little too readily abandoned over the last decade. The cut shows why there's still plenty to explore. In whole, though, Rio en Mdio's work is a new sound warmly familiar, icily estranged, and edgily balanced, a disc that will challenge your preconceptions of just how a soundfield should be laid and what tradition says it must contain. Track List:.
Heartless. Ferris.
The Umbrella. The Diamond Wall. Venus of Willendorf. Standing Horses. The Last Child's Tear. Fall Up. Stars Are.
NamelessEdited by: David N.
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, named after in her home state of New Mexico, is the work of Danielle Stech-Homsy. In 2006, Stech Homsy’s debut LP, The Bride of Dynamite, was released on Devendra Banhart’s label. The legend goes that she had recorded the record in secret after a returning from a trip to Russia where she had been translating poetry, only sharing the music with her best friend, Sierra, who swore to uphold the secrecy of the recordings.
Then, one day Banhart barged into Sierra’s apartment while the songs were playing and was immediately smitten, promising to share the music through his label. Three years later, Stech-Homsy is preparing to release her follow-up record, Frontier, on July 14th.Rio en Medio’s sound is dominated by her pixieish vocals and competent ukulele plucking set over a pastiche of found sound and light electronics. Needless to say, this isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but if you enjoy the music of or, you’re going to enjoy what you hear here. “Fall Up,” like the rest of the tracks on Frontier, was originally composed as part of a series of interweaving poems, and the song itself projects this idea in microcosm as its passages fade into and out of one another with the recorded samples serving as connective tissue.It is a fragile composition but the airiness of “Fall Up” is mediated by the sharpness of the found sounds and the harsher tones of the inorganic electronic instrumentation.
In this way, the track manages to strike a balance between wispiness and definition, although the oscillated synthesizer at the end may be taking the latter a bit too far, closing things with too pronounced an aftertaste.Again, Rio en Medio has a fairly defined audience; however, Stech-Homsy’s music clearly has integrity and shows no desire to pander to those who don’t “get it.”.