Plasma Splice Trifle pairs together Vibracathedral Orchestra member Neil Campbell’s Astral Social Club project with Alexander Tucker and Daniel O’Sullivan’s Grumbling Fur, and follows the duo’s collaborations with organ and stuffed toy enthusiast Charlemagne Palestine.

Recorded over the course of three years, Plasma Splice Trifle consists of four longform pieces full of arresting sonic detail and overflowing with ideas, each one possessing an inner turbulence resulting in layer upon layer of engaging ideas. ‘Back To The Egg’ bespeaks humankind’s backwards motion rather than its enlightenment, moving forward on an unstoppable pulse across which all manner of textures are permitted to develop – vocal loops, percussive splinters, the sounds of babies crying and gurgling wordlessly. The piece is placed in direct contrast with ‘Three Years Apart’, its restless clustering of synths, strings, drones and stuttering non-melodies swirling with a kind of psychedelic elegiac rapture.

The standout piece here is ‘Ozone Antifreeze Intelligence’, which progresses on a muted, heavily-phased rhythm at the intersection of dub’s atmospherics and a mid-70s Germanic motorik groove, offset by beautiful, questioning, haunting vocals and a hypnotic, cinematic piano refrain. The effect is like staring at a distant horizon, the entire landscape taking on a hazy, amorphous, liquified otherness.

Plasma Splice Trifle by Astral Social Club & Grumbling Fur Time Machine Orchestra is released on June 7 2019 by VHF Records.

Words: Mat Smith

(c) 2019 Further.