Spin Cycle: Into the Woods

Summertime respites are pretty much mandatory for Portlanders who can still hear the faint echoes of raindrops at the dawn of each day. For me, the unplugged therapy of Mt. Hood camping, kayaking, lakeing, and hiking is just the panacea for a steaming pile of societal noise. I escaped there recently, with the albums featured in this edition of Spin Cycle in tow—that is, until my trusty, aged Bluetooth speaker seemed to bite the dust. Instead, a chorus of chipmunk squeaks, squirrel chirps, and hawk hollers around Timothy Lake began to populate the earspace I typically reserve for spectrum-spanning electronic-based noises. And while it would be interesting to try to wax lyrical about that particular deluge of organic clamor, those varmints couldn’t hold much of a tune. So instead, let’s dig into a trio of albums that ride the line between both worlds, with both natural and synthetic vibes percolating throughout. 

Freak Out! – Punkers 

For fans of Daft Punk, DX3, Celldöd

Lassoing the sonic vocabulary of 1990s electronica, EBM, and punk-adjacent dance, Portland duo Freak Out! (DJs Break Mode and Palm Pilot) unleash their debut EP from local label collective, Bed of Roses. 

Freak Out! spins a provocative web of infectious basement party rhythms, with hooks spliced from copious audio samples dappled with gooey dance panache. The snares are embedded deeply from the onset, with a steady pulse guiding a trippy percussive thrust on the title track that gives way momentarily for a snippet of sampled dialogue about punk rock slam dancing from the straight-laced highway patrolmen of ’80s TV show, CHiPs. From there, the track explodes into a cosmic downpour of auditory delights, incorporating staccato synths, faux police sirens, unshakable beats, and a menagerie of borrowed punk quote curios—a manic buildup of aural treasures you’ll be unpacking for months.  

The timbre shifts on the heavy-lidded “Lucky Stoned,” a chilled-out slab of psychedelic slacker-pop that cribs from Iggy Pop’s classic “Funtime” with the focal line “I’m gonna get stoned and run around” grounding the track. A single guitar chord drives the song, which dips into and out of the beat throughout its seven-minute-plus runtime, morphing midway into a new wave pop bizarro twin, with echoes of washed-out, synth-based sheen wafting on the margins. 

“Herbs and Spices” accentuates the duo’s EBM tics with house accoutrement, while “The Answer” erupts from a funky, sparse intro toward a rollicking, nine-minute mashup of Euro-dance, electro, and liquid pop that triggers your techno leanings and implores your attendance on the dance floor. You will feel helpless not to abide. 

Punkers dropped June 12 via Bed of Roses. The EP is available for purchase on CD and digital copy through Freak Out!’s Bandcamp. For more information on Freak Out! and Bed of Roses, check out bedofroses.club.

Cinder Well – A Blooming Body

For fans of Ora Cogan, Songs: Ohia, Sybille Baier

The quiet corners of a creepy world come packaged in robust cuts of ethereal folk on Cinder Well’s latest album, A Blooming Body.

Helmed by talented Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Amelia Baker, Cinder Well actually started in Portland and played its first few shows here. It makes sense; the songs on their fifth album come choked in a resilient Northwest fog. The opener, “While the Womb Screams Silently,” exists at a crossroads of daunting lyrical imagery and fertile instrumental accents. The song is a stoic feminist anthem, inspired by the French film Portrait of a Lady on Fire, railing against a suffocating patriarchy while inviting lush swells of piano, violin, and French horn. 

“Of Nettles and Roses” emerges as an apt conceptual example for the album, a mostly barebones track of acoustic guitar and Baker’s gorgeous storytelling that wrings the coarse and the delicate, the good news and the bad, into blunt acceptance. The dense “Ashes” brings an avalanche of brass and strings that bisect the song’s shadowy highs, with Baker’s vocal lilt offering sanctuary in the darkness of her doom-folk folds. Baker’s moody tendencies are decorated by violin patina and sparse synths on “The Color of Earth,” which leads favorably into the minimalist “August,” featuring Twisted Teens’ Caspian Hollywell in something of a Blackbird Raum reunion. Here, the duo’s grizzled harmonies plot private observations of gloomy mundanity.

It’s not the rosiest album in the world, but rather a collection of evocative vignettes that hold a mirror back at the listener, urging you to notice, defy, and stand up when it’s called for.  

A Blooming Body was released July 17 through Hen House Studios. The LP is available for purchase on vinyl and CD via the Cinder Well Bandcamp. Cinder Well performs live at Mississippi Studios on July 22, opening for The Body and BIG|BRAVE. For ticket info, visit mississippistudios.com. For further info on Cinder Well, visit cinderwellmusic.com.

Piu – Milao

For fans of Björk, Sons Of, The Notwist

Vancouver Island’s Piu (Priyanka Chakrabarti) etches a brilliant statement on her experimental debut, Milao. 

Grounded in Indian raga and electric folk meditations, Milao bends its muses through time and memory by incorporating wide-ranging electronic elements along with field recordings and poetic verse to propel an album of distinct beauty. To wit, “Murmuration” seems suspended in mid-air at its outset before a more pronounced panorama of electronic wizardry elbows in. Throughout the instrumental, field recordings of bird calls in the foothills of the Himalayas and the coastline of Tsawwassen First Nation, BC, permeate the soundscape, pairing organic elements to an otherwise electro affair. The track “Flock of Crows” follows suit, utilizing the sounds of a bubbling brook found in Kolkata, India, near her grandmother’s home. The song’s synth-pop explodes into Piu’s subtle alchemy, as she lifts soft raga contours from the song’s busy beats. 

“Don’t Look Back” brings an atmospheric meditation on rearview perspective, using watery keys and Piu’s pliable vocals to great cinematic effect. Later, “Temple Tantrums” brings percussive elements that sound like empty bottles being struck alongside slow-burn bass and a sultry backbeat. Piu welcomes shifting gears, as noted mid-track, where a field recording of dhaak drummers preparing for autumnal festival Durga Puja yields a rhythmic interlude that carries the track to its finale and leads into the album’s final track, “Naaiya.” Here, Piu’s lush voice coos a raga aria before a multi-layered synth groove finds root and guides the song toward a mystical earspace that’s both liberating and danceable. 

Milao was self-released on June 26. The digital album is available to purchase through Piu’s Bandcamp.