WE’VE covered Dialect before in recent weeks, this outfit being the wholly otherly, seductive, beguiling, blissful and unusual project of Liverpool’s Andrew PM Hunt.
That was a month or so ago now; it was the title track from his forthcoming album, Under~Between, and we found it all kinds of trippily wondrous, noting at the time it was “a delightfully wayward cross-pollination of acoustic and synthetic ensembles with human voice, synth swoops and chatterings, so much more.
“It’s like the blissful soundtrack to the most psychedelic foreign animation you half-remember from childhood, unexpected sounds and melodies, bright tones swapping with strings, whispered voices, playful soundscapes. Pretty wow, actually.”
(We recommend you go catch up with that as well, you’ll find the suitably dreamscape video here, it’s so worth feeding into your brain.)
Today he’s released another single, “Flame Not Stone”, which is an equally off-kilter delight; impressionist vocal skitting seems to occupy a similar hallucinatory, experimental vocal space to Ian William Craig; pianos flourish; glowing, open electronica soothes; there’s touches of the aesthetic of Penguin Cafe Orchestra and the shining, optimistic bliss of Editions EG. Lushly lovely.
The eleven tracks of Dialect’s album, Under~Between, began as chamber pieces commissioned by the new music group Immix Ensemble; an opportunity that Andrew says gave an opportunity for him to enter a new and fertile phase. Writing for woodwinds, strings, piano and synthesizer, he focussed more on melody.
The collaborative nature of the work soon expanded beyond the Immix Ensemble to his own home – one he shares with 15 others, mainly also Liverpool scene creatives.
There’s very much still that humanist element of speech but, in place of the rapturous monologues that filled 2017’s Loose Blooms, there’s a more blissful chatter of communion and connection, a stillness. It’s a very singular vision.
Each piece was pruned delicately from its performance and reassembled by Andrew; in his words, he ”tend[ed] the garden.”
“I wanted to create something where there was a constant dialogue between the natural and technological, the mythical and the magical,” he says.
“Under~Between explores the limits of human knowledge and control; it gently reminds us of the transitional state of our surroundings and indeed ourselves.”
Dialect’s Under~Between will be released by RVNG Intl on March 19th, digitally and on vinyl; a portion of the proceeds will benefit Refugee Women Connect, an organization working to build a safe life in the UK for all women in the asylum seeker and refugee community. Pre-order your copy here.
Follow Andrew PM Hunt on Twitter and Instagram; and RVNG Intl. on those same socials, here and here respectively.
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