It’s January, the month of resolutions and reduced bank balances, so once again i’m starting the year exploring some of the more interesting music i’ve encountered that’s available free online.
It was in 2021, while in Huddersfield for the festival, that i learned about the music of Ko Takasugi-Czernowin, aka Ko T. C. As you may have immediately guessed, their mother is composer Chaya Czernowin, and it was she who was enthusiastically telling me all about Ko’s music. She found it a bit hard to explain exactly what it was like, and to be honest i feel rather similarly now. That being said, Pink Grey Sky, their earliest release, from 2016, is rather simpler and a good starting point for further listening.
It’s a short, 8-minute EP comprising three songs, and even though in many ways they’re very different in character from pretty much everything Ko T. C. has done since, many of the hallmarks of their style are present. ‘PGS’ is a short, relatively straightforward bit of bedroom pop, typically lo-fi, but with an irregular metre (5/8) and, most striking of all, a melodic line that seems ostensibly simple but has an irregular trajectory, following its angular contoured nose through unexpected harmonic and structural twists. ‘Knowles Pain Hall’ is even more lo-fi and similarly oblique, this time with a cheerful chugging momentum that’s almost a 60s throwback, Ko’s breathy vocals low in the mix. Final track ‘Ritalin’ goes another way, a slower song with an initially stodgy accompaniment, leading to a dreamy bit of reverie that abruptly dissolves at the emergence of a held synth note.
It’s all a bit like a cross between the cool, laidback retro-pop of C Duncan and the leftfield experimental song antics of Deerhoof. As such, i find it absolutely delightful, but i admit part of the reason for this is that it’s a fascinating point of origin for what Ko T. C. has done since. Massy Mass, from 2020, is an 8-track EP that explores similar lo-fi pop territory, supplemented by an immense, 41-minute bonus album containing a welter of demos that shed more light on this nascent period in their development. Strictly speaking, what they’ve done since is to plough this same furrow further, yet in such a sleek, almost plasticated form of pumped up, borderline insane pop that they seem almost unrecognisable by comparison.
The bridge to this is ‘Spider Verse‘, an erratic, quietly heartfelt song heavily redolent of Frank Zappa’s late synclavier work, still in the world of bedroom pop but now articulated with a computer rather than just a rudimentary synth and guitar. E/P (a 2-track EP that also comes with an 8-track bonus EP) was released in 2021 and converts Ko’s voice into that of a sped-up munchkin, as blissfully angular as ever, inhabiting a world of pounding playful beats, bonkers basslines and a myriad fantastical flourishes. It’s gleefully, joyously unhinged, as hilarious as it is utterly irresistible, and even here it’s the palpable lyricism at its heart that stops it from ever sounding like a novelty or mere superficial silliness. Their structures are fashioned on the fly, one moment entering an unexpected reflective repose, the next ramping up to a floor-pounding anthem. Even more thrilling is the remix of first track ‘Eternal’ by Phoebe FM which manages to up the demented ante even further, turning it into the semblance of a regular pop song as if created by some kind of malfunctioning AI. A more recent single, ‘Lands End‘, released in late 2022, is something of an amalgam of old and new, initially harking back to Ko T. C.’s earliest songs, before tilting on its axis halfway through, plunging back into the wonderland of glossy technicolor, veering even more maniacally between restraint and mayhem. Most recent of all is ‘Tiny Glimpse’, included on a compilation album last year, a beautiful, gentle song accompanied by soft synth arpeggios and discreet beats that comes closest to the tone of Pink Grey Sky.
i can’t recommend any of these releases highly enough, and they can all be had for a pittance. But Pink Grey Sky is where it all began, available as a free download available from Bandcamp.
I discovered Ko TC’s music a while back and have been following their career for a few years now. Expect great things from this kid