Rooted stylistically in electronica; lots of intriguing pops, crackles and fizzes along with reverb drenched pianos, voices, strings, chopped up guitars and various field recordings.
Jon Worsley has been producing and performing music under the moniker of Jilk for a number of years, and has amassed quite a number of compilation appearances and net label releases in that time. Carry On! is his most ambitious work to date, and is released by the indy loving UK label Bit Phalanx.
Jilk’s music is a sort of melancholy hybrid of folk and electronica – folktronica then, but not at all like Badly Drawn Boy, a little bit like Four Tet in places but not so that you would draw a comparison between them particularly (two acts often branded as folktronica). This EP is much more rooted stylistically in electronica; lots of intriguing pops, crackles and fizzes along with reverb drenched pianos, voices, strings, chopped up guitars and various field recordings. If you think that sounds a little bit like a sonic art student’s final college submission, it’s not I assure you. The EP is a well put together collection of music that is genuinely engaging and stylistically interesting. The folk influence is strong in the vocal oriented tracks, notably “Man up,yeah?” which is popping with sampled guitar, swirling textures and pretty cool percussion. It reminds me a little of the experimental folk outfit Tunng, who are excellent if you’ve never come across them before.
There’s a definite roughness to the music. It’s not polished. Many of the tracks have recording out takes included in them, and there might be the odd click here and there. I think this is an intentional part of the aesthetic of the EP, and it fits in quite nicely as it happens. We’ve all become very accustomed to the highly produced, edited and sonically ironed output of commercial music these days, to hear something a little rough round the edges is actually quite refreshing. Music isn’t perfect, nor should it be, just like us.
Track three is a particularly notable downtempo slice of subdued atmosphere featuring Japanese trailblazer Coppe on vocals. This lady has done a lot of stuff over a career which has seen her buddying up with the likes of Plaid, Q-bert, DJ Vadim and a whole load of other musicians, some of whom you might know, others whom you won’t. She’s worth checking out if you are unfamiliar.
Carry On! is a meandering musical stream of music which moves from the melancholy to the euphoric to the downright quirky. It makes use of all manner of live instruments, field recordings, sampling, synth work and who knows what along the way. Jilk is another unsung hero of the electronic music scene, very much worth checking out.
Carry On! is released on Bit Phalanx.
