Altered Zones

Denver-based electronic act Nyota (formerly Constellations) unleashed this Sterling Crispin-directed music video for "Savage Orb" a few days ago. You may recall Sterling Crispin from the visuals he made for Pictureplane's "Real Is A Feeling"; here, he ventures into more cosmic territory, channeling sunyata-- his self-professed reoccurring influence-- into the ebb and flow of the piece, at once dramatic and zenic. Given member Cory Brown's penchant for visually driven soundscapes, it's easy to experience "Savage Orb" first and foremost as a spatial, sonic territory. We become explorers washed ashore, mouthes agape as the descending keyboard motif, triangle-wave mutations, and warped field recordings contrast and intertwine.

With repeated listens, the sonic twists and turns articulate a story, narrated by the vocoder's existential hymn. Birds sing in the distance, at odds with the ominous synthesizers and chromatic keyboard line; a computerized voice sings, "You make the sun shine," and then the piece shifts to a new texture with the words, "You make the mountain side." Echoing feedback from a "hot desert sun" plunges into a "walk in the darkness," full of down-low, synth-bass wobbles and star-like, glassy synths in the sky of the mix. A climax is reached after the final stanza: "With your heat I feel I'm melting, losing all my human structure/ Just a pool of boiling water/ And then I'm gone." The bass drum sputters out of control as the synth pads phase into each other and rise heavenward. At last, we become one with it. --Matt Sullivan, Altered Zones

MP3: Nyota: "Savage Orb"

You can catch up with Nyota's back catalog at their old Bandcamp, check out lyrics at their new Bandcamp, or like them on Facebook