Limited to 300 copies
Ben Bondy's maiden offering for GMT from last year now makes its way to vinyl with the initial cassette run having, in very much typical GMT fashion, long since sold out. Camo is certainly fitting of a second look, a superior remodeling of the current Chain Reaction-referencing trend into some especially blissed-out, slo-mo spaces. Given his associates, Bondy has spent a fair bit of time positioned at the contemporary dreamzone intersection of minimal dub and late 90s glitch, but it's often been to much more abstract effect than on Camo - compare, for example, with the busied IDM of Glans Intercum or the more blown out electronics of the exael collaboration and the difference is fairly marked, even if it's obviously still the same artist. The decayed ambient aesthetic of West Mineral, 3XL/Experiences Ltd et al has been so compelling because of its privileging of the human touch, and Camo leans even further into that approach, the Real World bleeding through in simply processed guitar arpeggios, sampled rainstorms, windchimes pushed by the breeze. These are the kind of touches that make the best ambient music what it is, sound appearing as if it's just there, as if that's where it always was, an extension of the self into environment and/or vice versa. Camo marks out a serene, transportative space because of it, a late-night-into-early-morning sedative right for taking the edge off (or putting one on, depending on your preference of altered - but still very human - state).
