Minnie Musique Review

The Silk Demise: trip-hop/electronica/downtempo

“Few artists have been able to recreate the nineties trip hop greats like Massive Attack and Portishead, but out of Toronto comes a brilliantly heady mix of dark downtempo electronica. Bill Litshauer entered into an interesting cooperative with two vocalists, Edie Marshall and Olivia Zielinski. Music and vocals were conceived independentl. and even though these artists have never met in real life – a strong and talented working bond was established between Bill, Edie and Olivia. Admittedly, even though co-creating on something so personal with complete strangers sounded difficult to me, what drew them together were their musical affinities and influences, creating a perfect mix of brooding and sensuous melodies. What had started off as instrumental project was too richly exotic to leave alone, and vocals were born.

Inspired by The Nine Inch Nails, Mogwai, Hooverphonic and Massive Attack, crystal clean harmonies evolved over their nine year working period. Perhaps this had been a saving grace, allowing them to work together over longer periods of time, with no real time constraints, a sweetly indulgent and successful artistic endeavour.

Bill started playing on the keys when he was in University, and is self-taught. He started producing his first instrumental release in 2003. ‘The Silk Demise’ is a chthonic sounding debut, intelligently composed with a hypnotic ambience. The bass is palpable and deep, the rhythm tasty, and the piano beautifully organic with occasional carefully treated synths.

Their second album ‘Unlocked’ becomes more organic and elegantly continues working within the vocal realm with Edie Marshall’s voice beautifully delivering the foreboding taste that filters throughout their music . Having collaborated, Edie wrote the lyrics herself to the titles that Bill supplied. ‘Midnight Eyes’ seemed to be a prelude to their recent album ‘Music for A Film’ which turns into a beautiful late night listen, with shadows and echoes of sound effects, tribal sounding rhythms, a seamless flow from song to song, and outstanding production…to me these releases are timeless.”
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