A warm welcome to 2023 to all our subscribers. To kick off this year's curated selection we are going to highlight an amazing electronic musician, Chris Stewart AKA Black Marble and his 2nd album It’s Immaterial which was released in 2016.
Black Marble were formed in 2011 in Brooklyn by Chris Stewart and Ty Kube, taking their inspiration from the late 70s European ‘cold-wave’ movement of punk bands like Joy Division who were heavily influenced by early electronic musicians and komische bands like Can and Kraftwerk.
After a debut which despite a cold musical style was warmly received by many should have been a springboard for Stewart and Kube, but was unfortunately the end of their partnership and Stewart decided to relocate to the West Coast from Brooklyn, a journey many musicians have made both ways. Despite the change of scenery to the more constantly sunny Los Angeles Stewart was not influenced to move away from the style he and Kube had started on their debut together.
Looking to sustain the muted and gloomy sound of the debut, and doubling down on his Ian Curtis inspired disembodied vocals while accompanying these with ice cold synths, faulty sounding drum machines, and bass lines which would have made Peter Hook jealous. Stewart does however manage to strip away some of the more murky elements of the sound and allow for a slightly more direct and focused sound.
It’s Immaterial is interesting in the way it manages to meander between the fully electronic style embraced by soundtracks of the mid 2010s, and also of the late 70s and 80s which have clearly influenced him.
‘Iron Lung’, begins the album with a jangly guitar riff that has come to signify lo-fi synthwave Black Marble produces so well, it is straight-forward structurally, carried by a prominent bass and synth which help to spotlight the filtered vocals.
‘Woods’ and ‘Missing Sibling’ further sharpen this sound, the songs open up to fill more space in the tracks. Black Marbles’s songs move at a brisk pace, and Stewart’s vocals are deeply compressed and ethereal, while the lyrics come soaked in an effervescent melancholy.
On ‘A Different Arrangement’, Stewart’s vocals swim within a myriad of effects placed upon them, blurring the singing at points but not making the song too abstract, this blurred ambient atmosphere on the record does not deter from the real and prominent music Black Marble has created throughout the record.
It’s Immaterial arrived fully formed but you can feel the warm California sun, or at least the idea of it and the possibilities that it represents, poking through the bedroom blinds, while straddling the line between morose as a coping mechanism and gloom for the sake of gloom.
We hope you enjoy this months curated offering, and for those subscribers who have our double subscription the classic album for January is The Velvet Underground’s self titled 3rd album for your enjoyment.
Happy New Year
Stu & Abi
RRC