A lot of music passes under my pen with Charlie Nieland’s name attached. But, more often than not, this is because he is a much sought-after producer working with a whole host of tasteful and critically acclaimed bands. So it is nice to find one of his own songs, “Drown,” pop up in the review pile, especially since his last album, Divisions dropped four years ago.
As a taste of things to come from a four-track EP titled The Ocean Understands, which is due in a couple of months, “Drown” reminds us what a discerning and intelligent music maker he is. Sonically, we are faced with a searing slice of droning shoegaze, gaining its structure from the consistent and concise beats and its momentum from the lyrics, which give it form and focus, pulling this drifting, almost industrial soundscape, into a more accessible shape, preventing it from floating, untethered, off into the ether.
But it is in the lyrics that we find its most poignant moments. Inspired by Monique Vescia’s book ‘Hole In The Sky,’ the song echoes her Orwellian world where an authoritarian candidate won the US presidential election of 2020, throwing the country into the dark and dystopian, pushing the world to the brink. (Hmmm…sound familiar?)
Such a prescient prophecy and avant-garde music deserve a killer video, and here it is: New York City-based multi-disciplinary artist Hypnodoll provides the third sensory element, the visual one, to accompany the adventurous sonics and beguiling lyricism.
The song is written from the point of view of someone in the future looking back at the destruction of the past, with facts and stories, events, and tales all getting mixed up along the way. The video takes on a trippy and mythological quality. However, within the myths in question, we glimpse our present.
Some people write songs merely for entertainment. And while “Drown” is certainly a pleasing sonic experience, it is also artistic and intelligent, especially when heard in tandem with the video. It presents images and ideas, warnings and proclamations about what our future might hold. Like all warnings, they need to be acted upon before it is too late.
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The Ocean Understands EP
