Brief and bright minded, grief stricken and unresolved, a troubled tension given voice and sound. Simply a superb first album.
I always enjoy to see the progression of an artist. Growing and developing from outright obscurity to being picked up for first releases, it’s satisfying to see. Kline Coma Xero come under this heading. Tony Williams debuted on La Forme Lente’s Circuit D’Actes 3 and now this one man synth group is introducing its self titled debut LP on Medical Records.
A screeching pace is set by the opener. Percussion rattles, speeding over glass and gravel. The vocals are the brake, slow and sombre lyrics soaked in despair. The tempo is lowered for the lost love lament of “Rewind.” A downtrodden sadness runs through the LP, the emotion amplified by stark synthlines and pain streaked vocals. Instrumental pieces contain that same feeling, as with the harrowing “Deep End.” The sound and style of early Synth Wave pioneers is revisited across the record. “Fanatic” rings with the terseness of Crash Course in Science or Clock DVA while “Photo Falling” straight from the annals of the Human League. But Kline Coma Xero’s music is not pastiche, rather it is a continuation of that project from some twenty years ago. Similar to groups like Martial Canterel, KCX uses vintage machines to produce his warmed through coldness. Sorrow is folded by synthesizers, tears frozen in the mechanical turns of the dehumanizing “Mannequins.” The emotional spectrum is pushed and pulled, bittersweet regret countered by honeyed notes and rapid rhythm; as in the charming chords of “Minus One” or the instrumental hope of “Camera Talk II.” But it an overarching melancholy that dominates, one that permeates the LP and peaks with the gritty and gloomy “No Windows.”
Kline Coma Xero struck me immediately on La Forme Lente. Quality shone, something Troy Wadsworth realized. Brief and bright minded, grief stricken and unresolved, a troubled tension given voice and sound. Simply a superb first album.
Kline Coma Xero is available on Medical.
