These releases are not merely containers for music. They are thoughtfully conceived artistic objects that extend, deepen, and enrich the listening experience. They are works meant to be lived with, revisited, displayed, and cherished. Josh Mason‘s Kicking A Dark Horse, the third installment in the label’s FOLIO format, may be the clearest realization yet of that philosophy.
A single artistic statement expressed through multiple mediums
One of the enduring questions facing experimental music today is deceptively simple: why release music in physical form at all? In an era where nearly every recording is instantly accessible, what purpose can a tangible object still serve beyond nostalgia? With its FOLIO series, greyfade has been steadily constructing a compelling answer. These releases are not merely containers for music. They are thoughtfully conceived artistic objects that extend, deepen, and enrich the listening experience. They are works meant to be lived with, revisited, displayed, and cherished. Josh Mason‘s Kicking A Dark Horse, the third installment in the label’s FOLIO format, may be the clearest realization yet of that philosophy.
At first glance, the project presents itself as two parallel works: a nine-track electronic album and a hardcover book of experimental writing subtitled a nonlinear travelogue of the states of Florida. Yet the more time one spends with the release, the more apparent it becomes that separating the two is impossible. Mason and greyfade are explicit about this. Kicking A Dark Horse is not an album accompanied by a book, nor a book inspired by an album. It is a single artistic statement expressed through multiple mediums.
That ambitious premise succeeds because Mason‘s creative approach remains remarkably consistent across both forms. His music and writing are governed by similar principles: discontinuity, recursion, instability, and association. Both resist straightforward narratives. Both reward patience and curiosity.
Musically, Kicking A Dark Horse is among the most fascinating electronic releases I have encountered this year.
Fragments reappear altered and transformed ::
Mason, a Florida-based musician and sound artist whose work spans more than a decade of experimentation with modular synthesis, guitar, and electronics, has built these compositions around a custom modular framework operating on streams of binary data. Rather than pursuing total control over the system, he intentionally embraces its resistance. Sequences drift apart. Rhythms fall out of alignment. Fragments reappear altered and transformed.
The distinction Mason draws between randomness and chaos is essential to understanding the album’s achievement. These pieces never feel arbitrary. There is always a hidden logic at work beneath the surface. The music evolves organically, generating structures that seem to emerge naturally rather than being imposed from above.
The opening “Unincorporated Community Fight Song” immediately establishes this unique language. Softly bubbling textures, weathered tones, and subtle rhythmic instabilities create an atmosphere that feels unmistakably tied to place. Unlike much contemporary ambient music, which often favors generalized moods and placeless serenity, Mason‘s work is rooted in specific geography. These sounds feel lived-in. They carry traces of highways, motel signs, humid evenings, forgotten parking lots, and stretches of coastline.
Florida itself becomes a character throughout the work ::
Yet this is not a romanticized portrait. Mason captures something more complex and compelling. His Florida is beautiful, strange, fragile, and occasionally unsettling. The album’s textures often feel weathered by heat and time. Dusty clicks, degraded signals, phase-shifting artifacts, and low-resolution fragments drift through the mix like half-remembered memories.
What makes the record so rewarding is the balance between experimentation and emotional resonance. It would be easy for a project built around technical systems and conceptual frameworks to become academic. Instead, Kicking A Dark Horse remains deeply human.
Tracks such as “Would Go” and “Repair 22,000,000” reveal a remarkable sensitivity to pacing and atmosphere. Sounds emerge slowly, hover briefly, then dissolve before fully resolving. Harmonic fragments appear like distant landmarks glimpsed through fog. Nothing is overstated. Nothing feels forced.
Mason‘s live performance approach contributes significantly to this sense of vitality. Rather than assembling pieces through meticulous post-production alone, he conducts the system in real time, manually shifting divisions, guiding sequences, and responding to emergent behaviors as they occur. The resulting music feels alive. One can hear the delicate balancing act taking place, as though numerous independent systems are simultaneously threatening to drift apart while somehow remaining connected.
The companion text extends these ideas beautifully. Reading while listening creates an experience unlike any traditional album or book. Timelines collapse. Memories blur. Documentary details coexist with apparent invention. Meaning emerges through accumulation rather than explanation.
The effect is profoundly immersive ::
Equally impressive is the care with which greyfade has realized the physical object itself. The FOLIO format continues to demonstrate why the label has become one of the most exciting homes for contemporary experimental music. The linen hardcover presentation, thoughtful design, and integration of text and sound transform the release into something far more substantial than a conventional album package.
In many ways, greyfade is quietly redefining what a record label can be. Their releases feel less like products and more like complete artistic ecosystems. Every aspect, from mastering and design to sequencing and physical presentation, contributes to a unified vision. These are objects intended not simply to be consumed but to be kept.
Kicking A Dark Horse stands among the strongest examples of that philosophy. It is intellectually ambitious without becoming inaccessible. It is experimental without sacrificing emotional depth. It rewards close listening while remaining inviting and endlessly replayable.
Josh Mason has created something rare: a work that feels simultaneously personal and expansive, carefully structured yet constantly surprising. Together with greyfade‘s extraordinary presentation, the result is more than an album and more than a book.
It is an experience.
Kicking A Dark Horse is available on greyfade. [Bandcamp | Book]
