What if you made something for absolutely nobody? This is the question Fling ii asked before making their newest album, 3. They, like all of us, were exhausted by every click, view, and preference being commodified and resold to us and the world at large. Could they make an album that offered nothing to anyone? What could an album that, according to the press release I received, was inspired by “the vastness of parking lots, the prismatic strangeness of online advertisements for walking tai chi, and the passive performance of a basket of fruit sitting in a gas station” have to offer the band or anyone else?
As it turns out, a pretty cool record of krautrock / no wave electronica that borders on New Age music and vaporwave. Opening track “lau” pops and bubbles like the sound of a robot’s Zen alarm clock. “inke” drifts like a leaf on a stream that has no particular place to go and no timeline to get anywhere.
“bant” sounds like the opening to a weird VHS home course on meditation or computer science. “beem” takes on a slight country twang with its guitar tones but doesn’t lose the motorik beats or 32-bit synths. The electric piano takes the lead on “ilia,” creating a sound like an android’s morning commute radio station broadcast.
The album ends with “mago,” a trippy electro / krautrock cut that stretches to nearly sixteen minutes and takes you out of your current headspace and into some sort of forest that you’d find in the world of Tron.
This album immediately intrigues you and is the kind of record that will reveal something different every time you hear it…or maybe it won’t. After all, it was made to present you with nothing in particular. Again, from the press release, the band even states the album was “made especially for us and not for you, with all the gear we could get our paws on.” and that it “…stands as a quiet argument for surprise, accident, and the possibility of making something simply because it felt worth making.”
That’s accurate. Not everything has to be catered to your likes. Discovery, and being able to sit content with a discovery instead of seeking instant pleasure from the “next thing” is a lost passion. 3 proves this in every track.
Keep your mind open.
[You can subscribe. Or not. This blog is here for you if you want it, but no stress if you don’t.]
[Thanks to Dan from Discipline PR.]
