Pre-order here! https://alienjams.bandcamp.com/album/within-the-gaze-a-shadhavar
Kepla’s debut full-length, and his first release for Alien Jams, is an album of two contrasting approaches to collage-making. Derived entirely from field recordings and salvaged audio collected from online sample libraries, Within The Gaze, A Shadhavar is an impressionistic statement inspired by narratives of alienation and ruin.
The title itself refers to the mythical creature Shadhavar, “whose horn of hollow branches sounded sweetness or discord depending on the direction of the wind.” The album’s two long-form pieces – “The Angel Is You” and “Latent Mirror” – are opposites on multiple levels. The opening track’s cacophonous, full-spectrum sound is contrasted by the broad brushstrokes and the patient breaths on the second piece, and their themes – of “the ongoingness of life” and “a sense of resignation”, respectively – couldn’t be more different. As a whole, they represent an astute aural meditation on perception, reality and our sense of belonging.