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Absolutely mesmerising, incredibly talented duo, only discovered recently but I feel like I've been listening to you forever. Keep doing what you do, I'm a big fan!
Favorite track: Palms.
Helhest
I don't know if other fans share the same feeling with me, that we could already be listening to X&O for a very long time. And yet, you check the discography, and they are a relatively new duo. There's the undeniable dark electro from the 80s going, along with the analog synth and minimal, almost indie approach to this blippy bloppy poppy kind of sound that shaped minimal synth until today. The delicate texture of Miss Wendelbo's voice balances perfectly with the complex machine sounds. A must!
Favorite track: Marble.
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Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Vinyl Notes
Limited edition of 750 standard weight half-moon vinyl (half black, half clear); standard edition is standard weight black vinyl.
Standard weight vinyl is inserted into printed inner sleeve & 2-panel printed silver & black jacket with reverse finish
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Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album
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Half Moon Vinyl
Record/Vinyl + Digital Album
Includes unlimited streaming of Topiary
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Maybe the murder of screeching crows that surrounded Connecticut's Clubhouse Studio—turning all the trees jet black—was a sign that something was up with its latest tenants, Xeno & Oaklander. Well, that and the lunar eclipse that lit the starry night sky while Liz Wendelbo and Sean McBride plowed through another propulsive minimal-synth piece called "Palms."
"We've always referred to our synths as elemental," says Wendelbo. "Fire is what powers energy, voltage, and electricity. Electromagnetism is electric energy, like lightning in the sky. We control it with potentiometers and buttons; we shape it with filters and envelopes."
That explains why Xeno & Oaklander's music has always felt so alive, the result of chemical reactions at its core and chain-linked keys that rattle, hum, and howl. The duo's fifth album, Topiary, is no different; taking its title from hand-sculpted gardens like the stately grounds of Versailles and the highly ornamental Levins Hall, it's an enchanting listen, welcoming you into its self-made world with warm synth washes, moody chamber melodies, and Wendelbo's haunted yé-yé hooks. (Topiary is the first Xeno & Oaklander album McBride—a.k.a. solo artist Martial Canterel—didn't sing on, although his plush keyboard parts more than make up for it.)
As catchy as they are discomforting, Wendelbo's lyrics read like poison-tipped poetry, led by lucid passages like the following "Palms" excerpt:
The palms at night move in the light
The moon is blue
Strobes of delight
Symphony by the sea
Timpanies and mythology
The ships at night sail in the dark
The clouds glide through a ray of light
Symphony by the sea
Timpanies and mythology
Much like their seamless live sets—which have won over contemporary art crowds, underground dance clubs, and painlessly cool indie kids—songs bleed into one another, too, becoming moving parts of one streamlined organism, textured and orchestral at every turn. To reinforce the duo's self-aware sequencing, each side of the vinyl pressing is even bookended by a striking pop song and opulent instrumental. Another reason it's so fluid is the fact that Xeno & Oaklander broke out of their comfort zone by transplanting their synth-flanked Brooklyn space to a pro setting: Tom Tom Club's longtime studio, the Clubhouse.
"We began from a kind of Year Zero," explains McBride, "nothing written, nothing recorded, just a bracketed amount of time in which to compose, arrange, record, and mix the album. For me, this was a highly inspired month—living and breathing music from sun up to moon up."
Topiary's artwork echoes its electromagnetic themes as well; Wendelbo based it on a blown-up X-ray of protein molecules, shot through an electron microscope—a form of crystallography. Or as she puts it, rather cryptically, "What is deep inside of us is a reflection of what is above us. And electricity runs through it all."
credits
released June 3, 2016
Sean McBride, Liz Wendelbo: synthesizers, rhythm machines, voice
Written and produced by Sean McBride, Liz Wendelbo
Recorded at Clubhouse Studio
Mixed by Rick Kwan at Clubhouse Studio
Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio
'Protein X-Ray' Print and Artwork by Liz Wendelbo
With special thanks to Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth, Egan Frantz
All songs P+C 2016 Ghostly International under exclusive license from Xeno & Oaklander
Xeno & Oaklander are a minimal electronics duo (Liz Wendelbo and Sean McBride of Martial Canterel) based in Brooklyn, New
York. They have been deeply involved in the analog synth community since 2004 (the release of their debut Vigils LP on Xanten), and have helped promote and inspire the revival of synth wave in the US and throughout the world through their extensive touring and prolific output....more
Slowly backtracking and collecting the backcatalog of Boy Harsher here... As always rife with beautiful sounding detuned retro synth goodness and beautiful and melancholic vocal melodies.
In a couple week gonna get another chance to see you guys live in Riga again! Cheers comaunite
On their 10th record, the Glasgow-based group serves up more wonderfully menacing, gothy synthpop, perfect for dungeon dancing. Bandcamp New & Notable Aug 19, 2023