RADIATOR REVIEWS: Grimes/D'eon - Darkbloom

Darkbloom is a split LP between Grimes and friend of the collective D'eon, Put out by the two at the moment Labels which seems to have all the blogs right now suckling at their teats for some sweet milky content: Hippos In Tanks/Arabutus. Now Grimes has been getting a lot of buzz as a new artist for her work on 2010 LP Halfaxa and D'eon career seems to have exploded recently after releasing his Debut on Hippos Palinopsia. Both these artists share a lot in common, so it makes sense for them to collaborate. First off, they're both based in Montreal, a veritable mecca of musicians. Their voices share a breathy, ethereal and childlike quality. Both artists use their nasal tones often and unashamedly and there is a keen similarity between the way these two layer and sequence their arrangements. Listening to Darkbloom i can hear synth riffs on Grimes side that sound like they were probably composed by D'eon as well as ghosty additions on D'eon's side that scream Grimes. This album does come with a few gripes however so let me get right into them. It seems like there is a pretty clear distinction between the "hits" on this record and the rest of the tracks which boil down to filler. While tracks like "Vanessa" and "Crystal Ball" are pop music masterpieces in their own right, the intro and outro tracks to Grimes side play more like padding; cool-sounding enjoyable padding, but padding nonetheless. Then again a track like "Vanessa" deserves its own introduction, and Grimes side is particularly strong at its core. D'eon's side is where I feel most of the unrealized potential lies. The intro track to D'eon's side "Telepathy" would have been a fine intro if it hadn't been ruined by some choppy cellphone interference, which noisily clamours over the entire duration. I not exactly sure what the reason or meaning behind it was, maybe a comment on seperation created by mass media and culture, but from a sonic standpoint it adds nothing to the sound. "Thousand Mile Trench" Starts off jittery and unsure of itself. Midi clicks rapid-fire over D'eon's signature new age keyboard compositions and Gangsta rap inspired drum machines a la "To Kill a Man With A Joystick In Your Hand". "Transparency" may be the the de facto hit off D'eon's side but my personal favorite track and the one that stuck with me the most is "Tongues" where the theme from "Transparency" is first introduced. D'eon plays with variations of this theme in a way that I can only applaud. "Tongues" and "Transperency" are the only tracks on the side that play strong from beginning to end. Likewise, Darkbloom may be one of those not-so-rare records that is a victim of its own tracklist, in which the heavy hitters on this album unfortunately bring the various flaws on the other tracks to the surface. 8.2

Grimes - Vanessa

D'eon - Transparency

reviewed by Mohamed El-Darwish RADIATOR COLLECTIVE 2011

D'eon - Tear Down The Wall

D'eon has had a great year, his LP Palinopsia was fantastic, and his recent video for Old English Spelling Bee generated some real controversy, not to mention he's on a really a hot label. This Video in particular stands out to me. There are some serious issues dealt with here and not without risk. The terrible history of violence in Jerusalem and the holy land stems from our inherent distrust for one another. The only way to combat war is with peace but people are ignorant. Tear down the wall...

RADIATOR REVIEWS: D'eon - Palinopsia

Montreal resident and New Age Composer D'EON has had an extraordinary life leading up to the release of his new 12" Palinopsia, available for pre-order from Hippos In Tanks. A trained musician from birth, he originally planned on staying in Pakistan to learn Sufi Music when a "bunch of really awful shit happened" in Pakistan. D'eon opted instead to go to India where he lived for a year near the Tibetian border until he found what he was searching for in the form of a Tibetian monastary where he learned the dranyen and tibetian music under the tutalidge of monks. D'eon returned to Canada only to find the economy had collapsed. "things were ok, and then I went to India and hid out in seclusion for a while, and then I came back and the world had like completely disintegrated" says D'eon in his interview with Dummy Magazine "In Montreal a lot of people are really really bummed out you know, nobody has a job in Montreal. You know, people don’t have any money. So I don’t know, I guess it’s not really that bad, you know, relatively. But I think that the whole album [Palinopsia] is really just about the fact that any inner peace I may have gained in the mountains has pretty much been whittled down to a tiny little box of what it used to be because of the bullshit that is going on around us all the time."

D'eon - What We Wanna Be

D'eon's particular style of electronic music is refreshingly restraint, layering tracks at a calming and natural pace. We here in the western world have such short attention spans but Palinopsia takes its time and doesn't feel rushed or padded for length. The keyboard licks and synthesizer melodies that Palinopsia is built on do not feel repetative despite repeating usually many times during the course of a song. From its opening intro washed in twinkly lead to the lil-wayne-esque beat of "To Kill A Man With a Joystick In Your Hands", D'eon's infectious brand of eastern-influenced house music had me dancing all the way through.

D'eon - Kill A Man With A Joystick In Your Hand

"Recession Proof ($40 paycheque) is one such song with a rock-solid hook and poignant lyrics. "The ocean is a sewer, the city is a whore, money in the toilet, oil on our shore... we don't live here anymore". Yes a $40 paycheck, how the fuck is someone suppose to live on that? "2040" features arpeggio keyboard, woody bass and deceptively simple drum programing which give it a most pristine sound. "What We Want To Be" is possibly the most positive song on the record continues the incredibly catchy and danceable electro-pop that still hasn't got the least bit repetative. D'eon's compositions are constantly changing adding elements where they are needed and returning to familiar melodic themes at exactly the right moments. "To Kill A Man With a Joystick in Your Hand" is extremely potent lyrically, "everybody wanna fuck with the taliban, from kabul to pakistan", this track combines gangster-rap style drums (think new school) with eastern sounding vocal harmonies and sliding nasal tones characteristic of Asian and Middle Eastern music. Whirly synth and 80's drum n bass accompany D'eon's unique vocals on "Keep The Faith", Reminiscent of some lost Isley Brother's Track and "Across The Sea" is a dream.

D'eon - Across The Sea

This album is generally such a joy to listen to, it finds a way to stay refreshingly human despite the fact that most of the sounds here are quite artificial. 8.4

reviewed by Mohamed El-Darwish RADIATOR COLLECTIVE 2010