Blackwater - Navigation

Debut LP from London's Blackwater, who the very attentive amongst you may remember from that near-unsourceable 12" from 2018. That three year gap was not for nothing, as Navigation represents a notable outsizing of the ideas explored on that very murky-sounding first single. The basic sonic template of submerged dub atmospherics is expanded here across eight tracks which explore various manifestations of slo-motion synthpop and time-dilating electronics. The most obvious difference, however, is the addition of the human voice, which on one hand bears an uncanny resemblance to Carla dal Forno's whispery gloom, and the other recalls the dulcet lamentations of Thomas Bush's Old and Red or his vocal appearances on the RAP records. To that end, Blackwater does sit somewhere between the very London-sounding midnight world of the Jolly Discs set and the Australian scene's subtle shifting of dub aesthetics into a new pop lexicon (think CdF, CS + Kreme, YL Hooi, M. Quake et al), and with it conjures a distinct appeal that's all its own. A great debut.