SciFiSol – Alien Tung
cat# DU-GRNBRGR6

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“Do you have to hide / these dreams inside? / I wanna disappear with you,” intones Christina Broussard (aka SciFiSol) on one of Alien Tung‘s spacier tracks, the aptly-named “Dreamzone.” The heavy effects on her whispered vocals combine with distant, echoing percussion and atmospheric synths to provide a perfect soundtrack for disappearances. The album inhabits its own “Dreamzone” of sorts: one where pulsing techno gives way to ambient interludes; where thumping bass underpins lyrics that espouse a fierce, subversive feminism.

Nowhere is this last point more evident than on the album’s opener “Aversion II” which we’re excited to premiere here on Igloo. Over a dark synth-pop groove, Broussard sings “Rebel against a cookie-cutter / Aversion to tradition / Or what gets lost / She’s anti-everything”. A gritty, distorted synth line kicks in with that last lyric, propelling the track through its back half.

Next up is “Bite The Hand That Feeds,” anchored around a driving four-on-the-floor kick and repeated lyrical invocations of the title and the ominous, enticing question: “Do I have your permission?” Broussard uses her own voice here almost as sample-based techno artists would use a found snippet of a forgotten song. Via email, she explains: “I do tend to start with lyrics that I have translated from my poetry. And then I adjust them to fit the architecture of the song itself as it develops and unfolds, perhaps repeating sections here and there for more emphasis…. I am trying to move the written word off the page and breathe alternate life into it with the medium of sound.“

“Just a Game” and “NIN” exemplify the hardware-centric approach SciFiSol has evolved on this album. Live performances over the last several years, both solo and as one half of the more dance-oriented Camino Acid duo, refined a taste for experimentation and a meditative flow-state of music making. In both tracks, there’s a core of evolving synth textures and beats rooted in techno. And over the top flows Broussard’s voice, swirled through effects and moving from a whisper to a howl. Tweaking those effects during recording brought some of the happy accidents from a live show to the album. This process, she says, “allows for interesting textures and effected word play to unfold where it may not have if I were just working on the computer. I think this is because I am in a different headspace when not looking at a computer screen.”

“I do tend to start with lyrics that I have translated from my poetry. And then I adjust them to fit the architecture of the song itself as it develops and unfolds, perhaps repeating sections here and there for more emphasis…. I am trying to move the written word off the page and breathe alternate life into it with the medium of sound.” ~Christina Broussard

Conceptually, there’s a through-line connecting the tracks on Alien Tung that reveals itself over repeated listens. Broussard writes, “The theme of the songs revolve around the importance of developing a new language in which to communicate with each other, if we are to survive in the Universe.” The “alien tongue” of the title, then, represents the difficulty of communicating with the Other, anyone outside ourselves, even those closest to us. When these breakdowns happen, we operate from, as she puts it, “the principles of fear and lack rather than insight and gratitude.” Negative consequences manifest, from disconnection to ennui to hatred.

“Veil Slipped Off” makes these consequences explicit: “They couldn’t stand / her beauty / Tore them up inside / They wanna banish her to flames.” Harsh static beats and a wild, bleeped arpeggiation give way to softer chords halfway through, perhaps giving a measure of hope in opposition to the nihilistic opening: “The veil slipped off / The wind was wild / Skin hungry for their eyes.” The next track, “Baby I’m An Animal,” continues the theme with a more carnal, sensuous bent: a slinky techno thump anchors Broussard’s breathy warning: “Too strange to love / to be forgotten soon.“

The album’s final track “Hypnosis Black Ocean,” as the name suggests, is more of a guided meditation than a song per se. Dark ambient sound design and a suggestion to “Fall into the third eye / on three” entice the listener into a liminal space between sleep and waking, where the possibilities hinted at through the album—the positive, progressive future in opposition to the alien Other, and perhaps the “Dreamzone” itself—becomes accessible. ~igloomag

SciFiSol – Alien Tung (song lyrics)

Aversion II

Want me to twist myself
Into suffocation
Want me to confine
My desire
Make my body better
Make my body better
For you
All for you

Tell me
What did I give away
What did I lose
What did I give away
In the process
In the trade off
For survival

Boring plain white predictable
Rebel against a cookie-cutter
Aversion to tradition
Or what gets lost
She’s anti-everything
You can call her Super Witch
Turning the tables, a radical
Living up to her name

To prove a point she says
Cos after it all
The world is of her body, baby
We’re in her hands

Aversion, Aversion
I can see their Aversion











Bite the Hand That Feeds

By violence he held her hand
Some things I just can’t understand
Bite the hand that feeds you
Bite the hand that feeds

Do I have your permission?

Bite the hand that feeds you
Bite the hand that feeds

Just a Game

Just a game
I try to hold on
Keep going around
Keep going around
Just a game

Is this just a game?

Dreamzone

Do you have to wait
Do you have to hide
These dreams inside
I wanna disappear with you

Disappear with you
Another time
Another place
Another memory

The shape of you
To fall in love
While still awake
What is this life
About anyway

Behind closed eyes
You’re mine
You’re mine
You’re mine
Behind closed eyes
You’re mine


Baby, I’m an Animal

When the dark side
Of the moon
Turns away
Baby I’m an animal
Too strange to love
To be forgotten soon
When the moon
Turns to dark
When the dark side
Of the moon
Turns away

Watched my death
In slow motion
Lived in a poison mind
I was waiting for flowers
To bloom
Waiting for flowers
To bloom

Baby, I’m an animal
Too strange to love
To be forgotten soon
When the moon
Turns to dark
When the dark side
Of the moon
Turns away


















NIN

Tried to kill me
I just wouldn’t die
This place can’t contain me
It’s sure gonna try

I don’t need this
I can see the truth
Let it fall away
Away from you

They said
Silence your wisdom, girl
Must feel like dying
They said
Just be a good girl
You’ll get along fine
You’ll get along fine

But the look in your eye
Cuts so deep
Yeah the look in your eye
Cuts so deep
The look in your eye
Cuts so deep






















Veil Slipped Off

They couldn’t stand
Her beauty
Tore them up
Inside

They wanna banish
Her to flames
Before she shot them down
With purity

The veil slipped off
The wind was wild
Skin hungry for their eyes

They wanna banish
Her to flames
Before she shot them down
With purity

Power in vain
Sent them to their
Eternal Graves

The veil slipped off
The wind was wild
(Tore them up
Tore them up inside)
The veil slipped off
The wind was wild
Skin hungry for their eyes
















Hypnosis Black Ocean

Long form hypnosis
See with me
Be with me
Fall deeper
Further back deeper
Into time
Where the stars twinkle
In the night sky
Slowly humming
Into the window of time

Where you wanna be
Fall into the third eye
On three

Drifting drifting drifting
As I count back from five
Breathe blue
Aquamarine splendor
Deeper into time
The night sky
In your mind, the sound

The endless light
The ideal idea resides in
Your subconscious programming
A cryptograph you want to remember
One, induction complete
Begin 

credits

released October 31, 2020

A Cooperation of Detroit Underground and Christoph Grünberger´s new book “Analog Algorithm – Source-Related Grid Systems”. Selected Graphics are used as Cover-Designs of this exclusive edition of DU™Tapes. www.analog-algorithm.com

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