Get your ears ready for a clash of worlds with ultra-concept artist/d elektronika architect Third Bloom and genre-bending superpower Mishkin Fitzgerald. On the 30th of January, the pair released “Archive”, it’s ten tracks forming a cinematic adventure with no singular mapping possible. . While primarily intended to be an instrumental recording, the album is brimming with narrative intent. The album can be seen as a masterful blend between the precision of electronic production, the majesty of classical arrangements, and the epics of a film score. It’s not so much a traditional album, but a soundscape a carefully curated mix of moods and textures akin to browsing a gallery. How about we let’s remove the layers of the onion and examine the intricate underpinnings of this outstanding recording.

“Claw, Pt. 1” is the opening song of the album. It starts with a slow, spooky heartbeat from deep textures and sounds, coming across like drowning into a dark well. Musically speaking, the track heralds a sense of “Haunted Calm” before the crisp rattle of percussion sounds off anxious rhythms. This feels like the visceral entry for the theme of the album: surviving echoes and it is because of how the sound sort of vibrates you. The  track puts you into a place where everything you knew was taken away, leaving you with this ghostly melody floating around. It’s a spooky handshake; you gotta leave your world outside and get ready for what’s left.

The second song is named “Passenger”. The song shifts in point of view from dread to motionlessness of the previous song and lack of agency is what Passenger does following the atmospheric dread of the opener. Once again, Mishkin’s piano sounds provide contrast in their fragility within the electronic construct that Third Bloom is known for. It’s an exploration of what it means to be a bystander in one’s own life, moving through one’s own landscape like a ghost in the backseat. The effect is introspective and makes one confront moments where they have been a witness to. Where the first song chills, this song calms

This next track is called “Dark Horse Pt 1”. The song leans heavily into pure theatricality, starting with those swelling, emotive strings, rising and falling in an almost operatic tension. There’s a sense of brooding undercurrent-a feeling that some monumental event is always just over the horizon and never quite arrives. This song is very sharp and beautiful but the song’s background holds this dark yet thundering sound. The theme of this song seems very much about the “unknown factor”: the hidden strength, even though there are no words in the song. The song is the looming threat that resides in the shadows of a ruined world. It will leave listeners in a state of breathless anticipation, capturing justly the “Cinematic Grandiosity” this duo has come to be known for.

“History” seems to be the cerebral center of the song in terms of its intellectual focus; it launches with the faint sound of static and clear tones on the piano, like flipping through an old photo album with burned pictures. The vibe of the song is dark initially but then the tune ponders and reflect on the burden of what I think are our remains and the dread thought that history might simply be our choice in terms of the fragments we decide to hold on to. The song itself and its music are subtle and ponderous and leave the listener with a strong feeling of “archive fever. It also has very immersive sounds like glitching sounds that I have never heard in such a powerful way before

If the first half was the fall, then Claw, Pt. 2 is the realization of the trap. It opens with a delicate flutter of warm acoustic guitar, a jarring and abrupt contrast to the chilly digital textures heard previously. Still, this warmth is quickly overshadowed by a hazy stretch of ominous bass textures. It’s an investigation into the duality of memory-how something that once felt like a comforting embrace may eventually become the very thing that holds us back. The effect is dizzying in its mix of comfort and claustrophobia. I love how this feels like a sequel that stays true to the artist’s vision but, gives a new and fresh perspective

Next up is “Vault”. Vault has a muffled and distant sound, as though it can only be heard behind thick steel doors. Vault is, in essence, the sonic interpretation of emotional expression contained and suppressed as a means of survival in a post-apocalyptic world. Vault as a song has a sonic density, with deep orchestral arrangements that are heavy and pressurized. It provides an auditory chamber for the viewer to put their own “unspoken” thoughts and emotions. This song when added to a rap will be so marvelous and it breathes fresh life into the artist

The song that follows is “Source”. Again , going back to the idea of “signal,” “Source” starts off with less of a repetitive piano melody  and more of a rhythmic flow which gives off the idea of a beacon in the dark. Again, even though the song has no lyrics, the  theme of this song speaks to that it is about searching for the initial source, whether it was of pain or of beauty. There’s almost a shimmering quality to this production that gives off the idea of being in a “light-filled” space instead of in the darkness of the rest of this album. It attacks the subject from a space of hope, letting them know there’s a source to draw on in the midst of ruin.

Next is the track “Erosion”. Given its name and tone, this song has the overall sense of things falling apart, and it does so in real-time but it also sounds like a beacon or call for help that keeps repeating itself and pulsating. The song has a mecha-inspired grind to it, like a clock is being wound. Trailing strings are dim and worn out, complementing this melody. With this song, the general idea presented was one of slowing decay in the world and in humans. For the listener, it establishes a sense of “beautiful exhaustion”, realizing something beautiful in allowing things to fall apart and letting time pass.

The last bit one song is “Dark Horse, Pt. 2”. This short but powerful repeat serves as a counterpoint to this earlier melodrama. It launches with the same brooding intensity but quickly evolves to a more resolute, perhaps even cynical, conclusion. It implies that the “dark horse” was not a savior, nor was it even villainous, but only the truth about change. Musically, it is sharper, more refined, and serves as a harbinger to the finality of the album’s conclusion.

The album’s Curtain call is “Blackout”. The finale is an enthralling trip-hop-inspired explosion. It begins with a stab of buzzing sounds and an insistent drum beat that shatters the ambient calm of all its predecessors.  It is about the phenomenon of “blackout” – when the lights go out for good, but wanting to go out with a roar rather than a whimper. It brings the listener into complete silence at last, leaving the preceding 28 minutes feeling like a dream that has vanished as quickly as it began.

By seamlessly integrating rich orchestration, intricate electronic manipulation, and broad and expansive soundscapes, “Archive” skillfully dissolves the distinctions between art, music, and film to relate a tale that transcends the need to be spelled out. In a sense, it is a poignant and moving soundtrack to a world that has already been lost and yet a deeply contemplative and moving exploration of the digital and emotional trails left in its wake.

“Archive” is more than just a series of songs, it is a deeply musical exploration of memory in its most fragile form, of loss, in a clear and unvarnished post-apocalyptic landscape that has little, if any, semblance left with that which was previously familiar. Each song is a musical relic, a jagged but beautiful fragment of a memory from a future time that is at once alien but intimately familiar. It is an album which does not simply recall but seeks out, within the debris of the past, a strange beauty in a silent world

Stream the “Archive” album on Spotify 

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