Clark - Playground In A Lake

[auxien]

Quote

I want it to be a sonic portal, a refuge, an anchor for people, like a slab of subjective musical truth I submit to the deception machine, which is what the internet seems to have turned into over the last 10 years.

[jules]

https://pitchfork.com/news/clark-announces-new-album-playground-in-a-lake-shares-song-listen/

 

uuuuhhhhh......

 

Edited January 26, 2021 by jules

[Extralife]

Yeah...no thanks.

[thumbass]

Lol I thought this would be the reaction from you guys. Oh well

Edited January 27, 2021 by thumbass

[auxien]

i mean, the song isn't terrible. it's also not particularly interesting (imo) on its own. maybe in the context of the album it may work great, idk. released as the first single/teaser/whatever, it bored me...and that's the only context i have right now (along with his groan-worthy notes...oh, it was from a daydream? worked on it for 6 full years? 'heal myself through pure devotion to music' i mean....lol) so, yeah. not impressed. yet.

[chronical]

I really like this track. theres never enough singing and synths:)

[jules]

[beerwolf]

flol

[thumbass]

Listened to it a lot already, of course is love techno Clark but imo this sounds great aswell. New Clark is good clark

[joew]

Clark writes great melodies.

[sidewinder]

From Throttleclark:

Playground In A Lake is a story about the last human on earth, the betrayal of an innocent child and becoming a grown-up; growing a shell over our lost young selves. It’s the playground we bury and a drowned planet; an extinction myth.

I haven't listened to the track yet because I'm dialed in to a work all-hands meeting but I just wanna say I really dislike the album cover. But I appreciate jules' version. Maybe put a shark in there?

[thumbass]

6 hours ago, sidewinder said:

From Throttleclark:

Playground In A Lake is a story about the last human on earth, the betrayal of an innocent child and becoming a grown-up; growing a shell over our lost young selves. It’s the playground we bury and a drowned planet; an extinction myth.

I haven't listened to the track yet because I'm dialed in to a work all-hands meeting but I just wanna say I really dislike the album cover. But I appreciate jules' version. Maybe put a shark in there?

Its not the most original art but it fits the tone and mood of the art really well

[Lianne]

That track was...unexpected. A kid singing and analog synths are not the first thing a new Clark album brings to mind. Unexpected is good, but I personally like Clark a bit beefier and / or weirder / wonkier (which hasn’t happened so much in a while anyway)- and am not so into these more literal accounts of the music or straight legible lyrics, but I can see that kind of track doing well with the young generation who love very overtly emotional lo-if-ish sadness-on-sleeve feels music (all music is by nature emotional, whether it’s Stockhousen or Peter Gabriel, but you get what I mean.)

Edited January 31, 2021 by Lianne

[QQQ]

it's a bit of an odd/underwhelming choice for a single, but i like the track and i'm psyched for the album.

[zero]

don't think the bleep write up was posted yet, but, um, yeah...anyway, keeping an open mind until I hear the whole thing.

Quote

While the LP is beautifully adorned with romantic strings — a remarkable first for Clark, who taught himself how to read and write sheet music — its lead single ‘Small’ slyly buries the lede, or at least, sets a melancholic, fuzzy synth phrase front and centre. Matching its baroque atmosphere is a soft, adolescent vocal, grieving a tragic environmental collapse. This is where Playground in a Lake becomes grounded in its downcast context, the later string lament of ‘Emissary’ and the abyssal march of ‘Shut You Down’ bringing to mind the diary-like structure of Max Richter’s The Blue Notebooks in its anticipation of impending doom.

Clark outdoes himself on Playground in a Lake, bridging his electronic and classical sensibilities while crafting a powerful musical narrative for the end times.

 

[ncrtx]

Pff, underwhelming single. This man is the embodiment of hit or miss. If it slaps, it slaps. If it doesn't, it doesn't.

[Silent Member]

I like the choir boys Clark track. Watmm is a harsh place.

[Zephyr_Nova]

On 1/26/2021 at 9:51 AM, jules said:

Ahahahahahahahahaha

 

oh god damn that's funny...

Edited February 17, 2021 by Zephyr_Nova

[cern]

Clark sucks

[Lianne]

He has said strange (to me) things in recent interviews about how if music is all texture, that’s ok but it won’t be as “timeless” as music with proper melodic content. References to Bach, piano lessons, other things. I love classical music but I don’t agree, since early ambient textural musical from the 70s and 80s still sounds amazing. Anyway, in more than one occasion I’ve noticed a kind of maybe self-conscious new approach towards electronics and a desire to show he has skill in traditional notions of music. That’s fine if he wants to explore that more. I miss the wild Dionysian attitude of Clark’s music of old, but maybe this stuff speaks more to the current generation. Idk.

Edited February 19, 2021 by Lianne

[brian trageskin]

14 minutes ago, Lianne said:

He has said strange (to me) things in recent interviews about how if music is all texture, that’s ok but it won’t be as “timeless” as music with proper melodic content. 

he's right though

ambient sucks balls imo. mind you, clark's music too 

[xox]

7 minutes ago, brian trageskin said:

he's right though

ambient sucks balls imo. mind you, clark's music too 

Wattabou ambient with melodies? Boom!!!

[Lianne]

3 hours ago, brian trageskin said:

he's right though

ambient sucks balls imo. mind you, clark's music too 

I thought I’ve read posts of yours liking Autechre’s ambient side? But I may well be confused there.

@xox - melodies can be beautiful in ambient, but they bring a focal point in a different way. It’s often more interesting to me when the evolving textures IS the soundscape because your attention is kind of lost in this vast space and it feels disorientating. Unless it’s sonically crap and then of course it is boring and has no atmosphere. 

 

Edited February 20, 2021 by Lianne

[cern]

Clark:
 

“Even though I’ve taught myself how to read and write sheet music, I’m not putting that genre, or any other genre on a silver platter. I’m not from an institutionalised contingent who deem a narrow range of instruments ‘the real stuff’ and everything else worthless commercial pop. I take what I admire from that world and then move on. I’m just using it as another colour.”

Wat a fucking douche. 

[xox]

47 minutes ago, Lianne said:

I thought I’ve read posts of yours liking Autechre’s ambient side? But I may well be confused there.

@xox - melodies can be beautiful in ambient, but they bring a focal point in a different way. It’s often more interesting to me when the evolving textures IS the soundscape because your attention is kind of lost in this vast space and it feels disorientating. Unless it’s sonically crap and then of course it is boring and has no atmosphere. 

 

Yes agree! But it also differs what we mean by ambient bc there’s fax records’ ambient and there’s brian eno’s philosophy of ambient and many more. Also what we mean by melody bc imo not every chromatic change/event is a melody... and so on...