paul_guyet
Huge fan of COIL, so, naturally, I'm a huge fan of DMD. His explorations are unrivalled. Plus, 'Tongs' is where I want to live.
Favorite track: Tongs.
yintov
Loving this beautiful collection. it's great to hear earlier versions and demos which show the more industrial side of Drew's work
Favorite track: Live at Alphaville - Brooklyn, NY 2015.
Includes 4 studios albums + bonus material: Collapse, Unnatural Channel, The Third Helix, Agalma; and 2 unreleased discs, Undulations and Aberrations, and Entanglement.
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Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
This long-gestating box set of Scottish electronic pioneer Drew McDowall’s solo work takes its title from a technical term meaning ‘plate’ or ‘layer’ most often used in contexts either geological or anatomical: 'Lamina'. He speaks of the compiling process similarly: “Digging into my archives felt like a mix of psychoanalysis and archaeology – uncovering buried things.” The six CD collection includes expanded editions of his four most recent Dais LPs ('Collapse', 2015; 'Unnatural Channel', 2017; 'The Third Helix', 2018; and 'Agalma', 2020), alongside a disc of rarities ('Undulations and Aberrations') and one of live performances ('Entanglement'). Taken together, it presents a definitive portrait of McDowall’s cryptic, questing artistry, forever seeking “that sense of stepping over a threshold.”
The bonus material in particular is revelatory, broadening both the context and complexity of its respective full-length. “Hypnotic Congress Palisades (demo),” a 'Collapse' outtake, patiently builds a mantric throb into a rippling cascade of head- nodding cosmic noise, like some glowing shrapnel splintered off the rest of the record. “Tell Me The Name (sketch),” a reworking of the eerie opener of 'Unnatural Channel', embodies McDowall’s goal for the compilation as “a window into the process of iteration.” More emaciated and reptilian than the original mix, the track shivers and shimmers in a reverie of alien melancholy, a corrupted file of some interdimensional hymn. “False Memory (demo),” from 'The Third Helix' sessions, showcases the textural trial-and-error behind these compositions – a wobbly collage of seasick scrapings, sine waves, and tectonic circuitry, tested like source material in a lab. Similarly, an unreleased 'Agalma' vault cut, “MBCST,” captures the artist at the brink of breakthrough – a time-stretched drone traced in muffled voices and phasered haze dilates across five lysergic minutes. It’s the sound of a palette being refined, poised for deployment.
The fifth disc spans two decades of stray recordings, from 90’s studio experiments to lost comp tracks to sold-out tapes, modular oddities, and rhythmic sketches. Sequenced chronologically, it demonstrates the zig-zagging evolution of McDowall’s sound, colored by formative years collaborating in Coil but extrapolated into freshly forking paths: industrial dub, icy downtempo, tonal devotionals, hexed gamelan, interstitial murk. The suite of live sets, too, is essential listening. He describes his inclusion criteria as performances that fuse “the sacred and the feral, like you’re in a cathedral but the floor is dirt.” All four recordings are rich and unhinged: a spiraling, seething, somber voyage for Ascetic House and Mount Analog’s’s dark experimental series, Nuit Noire; a jagged, dissonant excerpt from his 'Collapse' release show at New York venue Alphaville; a fractured, psychedelic rendering of “Agalma III” for Root Radio’s Exist Festival live stream; and a delirious, magisterial take of “Agalma I” (“Fold (Live)”) for the 'Agalma' release party at Strange Editions produced by Quo Vadis (his ambition for which was “to mirror the pandemic-related ontological feeling of being suspended in mid-air”).
Despite its duration, 'Lamina' is a leanly plotted survey, devoid of dead weight. Few artists as omnivorous as McDowall are also as self-editing – his standards are rigorous, and revealing: “While working, I’m always changing things, hacking them away, abandoning them when they don’t work. When listening back I’m looking for a sense of awe and wonder. Otherworldly magic. If I’m not hearing that, I don’t see the point.”
Lamina [2023]:
Remastered by Josh Bonati
Art by Rose Johansen
Layout design by Collin Fletcher
Disc 1 - Collapse [2015]:
Produced & Mixed by Drew McDowall
Cover artwork by Steven Vallot
Design and Layout by Gibby Miller
Violin on "Through Is Out" by Hiro Kone
Disc 2 - Unnatural Channel [2017]:
Produced by Drew McDowall
Mixed by Joshua Eustis
Artwork by Nina Hartmann
Vocals, lyrics on "This Is What It's Like" & "Unshielded" by Roxy Farman
Disc 3 - The Third Helix [2018]:
Mixed by Drew McDowall
Artwork by JS Aurelius
Vocals, Violin, Addition Production on "False Memory" by James K
Disc 4 - Agalma [2020]:
Produced & Mixed by Ben Greenberg / Drew McDowall
Artwork by Caroline Schub
Marilu Donovan - Harp on Agalma I, II & VII
Adam Markeiwicz - Violin on Agalma III–VI
Justin Frye - Double Bass on Agalma III–VI
Disc 5 - Undulations and Aberrations [2023]:
Artwork by Rose Johansen and Collin Fletcher
Disc 6 - Entanglement [2023]:
Artwork by Rose Johansen and Collin Fletcher
"Agalma III - Beacon (Live)" from Strange Editions, Brooklyn NY 2020
"Fold (Live)" from Root Radio/Exist Festival 2020
It's a Coil album. I really need not say more than that, but I will.
A one-of-a-kind electronic album that remains exciting over thirty years later. I love the acid-y techno bits and the vocoded vocals. Essential Coil album - essential electronic and post-industrial album.
The title track is a masterpiece. polyat6742
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