Piotr Kurek // Songs and Bodies LP

※11月上旬再入荷後発送します

Tobiraインストアショーケースでも素晴らしいライブを披露してくれたポーランドの異端作家Piotr Kurekが、2025年10月にUnsoundからリリースしたレコードです。

90'sポストロック〜スローコア〜アンビエント・ジャズ10曲を収録。

以下、レーベルによる解説です。

"ノスタルジアの行使ではなく、『Songs and Bodies』は新たな技術的夜明けを世界が直視する中、90年代と00年代の実験的ロックの正典を検証し、その人間性を浮き彫りにする。一見すると、Kurekの楽曲は驚くほど有機的で、透き通るようなギター主導の瞑想曲のように見える。時代を象徴するオルガンやエレクトリックピアノのヴァンプ、謎めいたボーカル、ほこりっぽいドラムで彩られているが、それはすべて幻想だ。もう少し注意深く聴くと、しわが現れる——ロボットのような不明瞭な発音、ぎこちないテンポの変化、そして魅力的なつまずき。

Kurekはこうした脆弱性と欠陥を蒸留し、身近な音と仕草を深く個人的でありながら共感できる抽象像として提示する。これは作曲家が古風なソングライティングに最も近づいた作品だが、最終的な到達点は同じだ——ますますデジタル化する存在の曇りガラス越しに、その向こう側を見つめるよう誘う作品なのである。"

------------------------------------------------------

12" black vinyl.

Tracklist:           

1. Forever / The Way In 04:18
2. It Used to Be a Song 05:13
3. And Yet Through This 04:49
4. More Than One 03:08
5. Nothing Holds Still 05:00
6. Songs and Bodies 05:28
7. Turtle Heart 02:32
8. Try To Be True 03:49
9. The Water Is Wide 04:06
10. This Is Where I Thought You'd Be 03:50

Unsound:

"'Songs and Bodies' is best described as hypnagogic post-rock, an impressionistic blur of dissociated riffs, jazzy rhythms and half-heard voices that casts a beguiling digital silhouette of '90s indie music. The album began as a personal experiment, a question that emerged as Piotr Kurek cast his mind back to the era that birthed bands like Gastr del Sol, Bark Psychosis, Labradford and The Sea and Cake. Curious how this music might sound in today’s cultural climate, he started recording sketches at home on guitar and keyboard, applying the same advanced processing, editing and manipulation techniques that had nourished his last run of albums. Early on, he brought in drummer Mateusz Rychlicki and bassist Wojciech Traczyk, layering their performances into the evolving material. These ideas might have remained in that unvarnished state had Unsound not suggested a live performance of the work in October 2024. Spurred by the invitation, Kurek hardened his resolve, finishing a crumpled, uncanny set of half-songs that extend the chimerical sonic universe of the jazz-inspired 'Smartwoods' and its baroque predecessor 'Peach Blossom'.

Not an exercise in nostalgia, 'Songs and Bodies' is an examination of the '90s and '00s experimental rock canon that isolates its humanity as the world stares down a new technological dawn. At a glance, Kurek's songs are remarkably organic, diaphanous guitar-led meditations embellished with era-specific organ and electric piano vamps, cryptic vocal utterances and dusty drums, but it's all an illusion. Listen a little closer and the wrinkles appear—the robotic, garbled articulations, awkward tempo fluctuations and charming hiccups.

Kurek distills these vulnerabilities and blemishes to present a deeply personal but relatable abstraction of familiar sounds and gestures. It's the closest the composer has come to old-fashioned songwriting, but the end result is the same: an invitation to look beyond the frosted glass of an increasingly digital existence. "

Artist : Piotr Kurek

Label : Unsound

cat no : UNS013