The first eager moments of “Rolling Night Tide” from Matthew Akers’ newest tape signals a new direction from the electronic musician’s last tape, The Elders of New Detroit. It’s… POPPY! And I dig the singular groove that strides 80s analog and 90s grime as it chills out for six minutes of B-roll energy. But it’s a trap: Mythical Abyss soon devolves into the same cryptic landscape that haunted Elders, this time with a mesmerizing replication of alien abduction during the epically eerie “Taken Aboard.” It’s as if Akers was in the midst of a stroll before going past his neighborhood boundary and discovering the rest of the world is in utter madness. Was his a village of the damned, or has he found himself in the middle of those doomed to nuclear fallout and extraterrestrial invasion? Isn’t it the plight we all experience when snatched from the clutches of our comfort zone? It’s becoming a trademark of Akers, one that makes the skin crawl with abhorrent anticipation. Why I crave these odd fatalist fantasies are beyond me, but clearly I am not alone in my stagnate pool of the bizarre.
More about: M. Akers
