Kerala Dust - Violet Drive [CD]

Kerala Dust's new album, Violet Drive, is a record deeply affected and influenced by it's surroundings. The band, formed in London in 2016, are now based between Berlin and Zurich, and the three Brits have created a deeply European album torn between the past and future. Formed out of a growing love of electronic music mixed with a history in indie bands, Edmund Kenny started the band at a time when making electronic music on a laptop "seemed like the most sensible thing to do". Hypnotic elements are a defining force behind Kerala Dust, whose music incorporates blues and americana mixed thrillingly with untraditional electronic beats. While releasing debut album, Light, West, towards the end of 2020, the band were diving into their new base of Berlin and letting it's deep, complicated history and landscapes influence their next move. "These remnants are just standing there," Edmund adds. "Remnants of the wall in the middle of the city, old motorways built by the Nazis, all of these things that are left to rot because they are quite shameful. They all carry some weight of history that wasn't even too long ago, and going around and looking at those really, really informed the sound of the record." In a break from past ways of working, the songs on Violet Drive were built from the drums up, and this truly stunning, off-kilter percussion defines the album; in keeping with the record's inspirations, they often sound like a war cry. Recorded in two weeks in a studio in the Alps just outside of Zurich, the thudding backbeat laid down provide the framework upon which the album's lyrics and instrumentation - flashes of bluesy guitars and woozy synths, Edmund's deliciously deep, syrupy voice - bounce off and flesh the songs out creating a duality that defines the album, and forms the thrilling beating heart of Kerala Dust. Kerala Dust's new album, Violet Drive, is a record deeply affected and influenced by it's surroundings. The band, formed in London in 2016, are now based between Berlin and Zurich, and the three Brits have created a deeply European album torn between the past and future. Formed out of a growing love of electronic music mixed with a history in indie bands, Edmund Kenny started the band at a time when making electronic music on a laptop "seemed like the most sensible thing to do". Hypnotic elements are a defining force behind Kerala Dust, whose music incorporates blues and americana mixed thrillingly with untraditional electronic beats. While releasing debut album, Light, West, towards the end of 2020, the band were diving into their new base of Berlin and letting it's deep, complicated history and landscapes influence their next move. "These remnants are just standing there," Edmund adds. "Remnants of the wall in the middle of the city, old motorways built by the Nazis, all of these things that are left to rot because they are quite shameful. They all carry some weight of history that wasn't even too long ago, and going around and looking at those really, really informed the sound of the record." In a break from past ways of working, the songs on Violet Drive were built from the drums up, and this truly stunning, off-kilter percussion defines the album; in keeping with the record's inspirations, they often sound like a war cry. Recorded in two weeks in a studio in the Alps just outside of Zurich, the thudding backbeat laid down provide the framework upon which the album's lyrics and instrumentation - flashes of bluesy guitars and woozy synths, Edmund's deliciously deep, syrupy voice - bounce off and flesh the songs out creating a duality that defines the album, and forms the thrilling beating heart of Kerala Dust.