Album Review: Dustin Wong & Ari Liloia – ‘Guided To The Panoramic Merge’: delivering a box of folktronica delights and intricate sound-crafting.

The Breakdown

That these Pittsburgh to LA exchanges have produced such rounded, coherent and thrilling electronic music highlights that this was a musical relationship which really gelled.

A Red Thread – 8.8

There’s several reasons why you really shouldn’t let the release of ‘Guided To The Panoramic Merge’ pass you by as the year fades out. First it’s the inaugural collaboration between erstwhile post rock guitarist of significance and more recently electronic sound-scaper, Dustin Wong and emerging folktronica voice Ari Liloia. Secondly it’s on A Red Thread, the digital only imprint of Californian experimental networkers Katuktu Collective, and a platform that does things right. All the proceeds from monthly sales on the label goes to a different community group supporting the likes of the Chicago Abortion Fund, the Trans Formations Project or the Native American Land Conservancy in their work. Check out A Red Thread’s Bandcamp page (HERE) for more details of the label’s continuing commitment to the human spirit and info on December’s recipients, The Palestine Children’s Relief Fund.

And finally, as usual with anything appearing through the Katuktu/A Red Thread portal, ‘Guided To The Panoramic Merge’ is a box of distinctive delights. The EP was developed from a connection made via Bandcamp messaging which quickly sparked a flurry of virtual music sharing and shaping between Liloia and Wong. For these Pittsburgh to LA exchanges to produce such rounded, coherent and thrilling electronic music highlights that this was a musical relationship which really gelled. Each composer brings something of their own, Liloia the quirky playfulness plus bedroom pop bounce and Wong the melodic depth and dramatic structuring, with overall results that are both lively and lyrical.

The opener, Ascending Through the Bellscope (Anode version), immediately shows such fluency in action. The sparse lo-fi gamelan tip toes in but minimal is not the tone here. Skittering beats mingle and mix busily, clicks and chimes, pulses and puffs making for an intricate, rhythmic mechanism and overall sonic fizz. Light and buoyant, the trajectory is looking up not down, with jaunty autotune giving the vocal hooks a gleeful cartoon twang. There are pauses and flutters, some perky beat-box phrasing and bursts of blossoming synth chords to further energise the chemical reaction that Liloia and Wong are brewing. Hints of Matthewdavid’s hyperactive ‘Mycelium Music’ from earlier this year or maybe some residue from Dustin Wong’s recent collab with Brin come through but it’s the fine detailing and levity that gives this version of Ascending Through The Bellscope its own distinction.

With ‘Guided To The Panoramic Merge’ featuring four cuts or more specifically two versions of two core tunes, you might assume that the ideas get stretched a bit thinly, but that would be a cheap swipe. The complimentary Ascending Through The Bellscope (Cathode version) looks to regenerate ideas underpinning the base composition rather than lazily remix or destructively re-configure. Liloia and Wong present this second take as if it was recorded at a different (virtual) session with juggled instrumentation. The key point is that the partnership deliver a very different perspective on ‘Cathode’ that’s intriguing in its own right.

This take feels more dialled up, the beats more sonorous and certain, the vocals more out front, the lines brushed definitively, less sketched. Ascending Through The Bellscope (Cathode version) is assertive and urgent in its output but without losing those surprising twists and turns. Ringing loops with a Japanese new age clarity, the more unhinged vocal scat and a stoic bass drum thud throughout, it’s more hypnotic but no less impactful.

The other paired tracks Guided to the Panoramic Merge (Glass Version) and ditto (Felt Version) make for a similar convergent/divergent comparison. The former shines with a gleaming vocal polish, sounds which still allow you to look inside and imagine something deeper. Sometimes close to a gentle horn fanfare , often whispering a ‘hush’ and at others tight in harmony, it’s these voices that glide over almost folky, clapping rhythms and skate around the plucking synths. There’s a real elegance in this particular Wong/Liloia interplay similar to More_Ease pop but without the tense fragmentation.

The collection winds up with Guided to the Panoramic Merge (Felt Version) and once more the partnership add subtle diversions to keep things fresh. It’s a track where acoustic sounds (maybe instruments) are given some air space. A piano patterns trips through the melody, there’s the warm glow of a bass line, the waft of a reedy organ and zither-like strums to build the dynamic. Less pristine than its counterpart track, it brings some homely cosiness to the closing moments of this particular Liloia/Wong escapade.

‘Guided to the Panoramic Merge‘ clearly stands as a soundtrack which nestles comfortably alongside A Red Thread’s commitment to supporting tolerance and hope. Bringing things together, building a common language and resolving individualities are the major achievements on a recording that genuinely bubbles with positivity.