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There has long been an obsession with what the “future of music” looks like. How it will be constructed, perceived, analyzed, interacted with. So much brainpower is put into what’s next, because we always want to be one step ahead. Culturally prescient, enlightened, on the cutting edge. But what if you sidestep all that noise? What if a band, freed from the rat race and trendiness, embraces insularity to the point it somehow becomes the future? With do you love the color of the sky?, Dummy crafts the perfect anti-zeitgeist record, freezing you into their incorporeal moment of time.
If 2024’s Free Energy (and its subsequent remix album, Bubbelibrium DLC) evoked the spirit of Madchester and the optimism of the rave, then Dummy’s newest couches itself in a lyrical skepticism that recalls the best of post-rock and drone—think Seefeel, Windy and Carl, Laika, or Disco Inferno—while playfully adorned in jubilant pop hues of early Björk, The Sundays, and Madonna's Ray of Light.
With songs that touch on Earth’s climate degradation (as heard on the propulsive album opener “April Limousine”), A.I. and the devaluation of art (on lead single “Full Spectrum Dominance”), and how we’ve been conditioned into accepting the surveillance state (on the penultimate album track “N of 1”), do you love the color of the sky? is their most politically trenchant record, and yet their most inviting. Breakbeats and the captivating voice of keyboardist Emma Maatman belie a sleight hand—as the listener becomes enveloped by Dummy’s unshakable grooves, they’ve subconsciously accrued a vision of a new radical politic. As Maatman expresses, “A.I. could not exist without the harvesting of our data and using all of humanity’s intellectual property and collective work.”
Don’t worry about the heavy themes though; DYLTCOTS? straight up rips.
Guitarist Joe Trainor and drummer Alex Ewell are specific in their commitment to reverence for the form, while the melodic toplines of Maatman, Ewell, and guitarist Nathan O’Dell stick to your brain without being rote or facile. When “Alluvial Fan” starts with its stretched chord, it thrusts into an arrested mode of effortless cool a la A.R. Kane’s dream pop, Goldie’s jungle (courtesy of O’Dell’s vocals), or “Squeaky Wheel,” where sampled guitar feedback recalls Tricky’s Maxiquaye in its assertion of intent; this is what music, according to Dummy, can/should/will be.
Despite all the allusions to futurism, Dummy are a classic band. Not in the retrofetishist, nostalgia- trapping sense, but in their work ethic and commitment to the music. As Trainor recalls of their time since the release of Free Energy, “We toured a lot, around 150 days, and played approximately 113 shows,” with numerous treks around the US and two trips to Europe, “...and on larger stages than ever before,” adds Ewell. “Touring has had a huge impact on us and our music.”
That is a staggering amount of touring and roadtripping, a feat that can only be achieved if you truly believe in your art and the power of music itself. It stands to reason, then, that their latest release has also completely shucked the idea of being recreated cleanly in the live setting. Ewell acknowledges that performances might go “off the rails” with the amount of samples, loops, delays, and pedals strewn throughout do you love the color of the sky?, but that they also “want to push the limits” of what’s achievable. As Trainor observes, studio recordings and live performances are “different sides to the same Dummy coin,” noting that while future touring will “involve more tech,” their vehemently “anti-laptop on stage” stance celebrates precision and letting their frayed edges show.
“Making music shouldn’t be fun.” It’s a haughty claim, but when Dummy jokingly asserts this, it comes from a sentiment of earnestness and true love for the game. Contributions that touring bassist-turned- full-time-member, Lance Umble, imprints onto album closer “Heaven’s What You Make of It” suggests a band culture of togetherness and reciprocity; inclusion for the sake of better art. The blood, sweat, and tears of ‘putting in the work’ is what propels do you love the color of the sky? to a triumph—a byproduct of shedding skins through live performance. It’s not a vast departure from their discography, unmistakably them, and yet constitutes a creative leap forward which almost sounds effortless from the group. It’s a treat to witness a band this creatively in-tune with themselves, whose experiments and ideas always hit, who, when they describe a concept, actually stick the landing. Maybe the future of music comes with the type of deep self-actualization Dummy possesses.
What a time to be alive, indeed.
The official slogan of the state of Ohio is “The Heart of it All,” which is as much a statement of hard geographic fact as it is romantic self-regard. If you’re east of the Mississippi and looking to get from whatever here to whichever there, you’ll likely have to reckon with Ohio's crucial collection of arteries. Two of them pass through the middle, through the heart of the heart: here, bisected by interstates 70 and 71, lies the ever-modest metropolis of Columbus. Here is the hometown of the mighty Golomb.
Formed in 2020 by high-school sweethearts Mickey and Xenia along with Xenia’s astonishing kid-brother-drummer Hawken, Golomb's jagged, churning, relentlessly melodic noise-rock - like the Vaselines fronting Unwound - hit the local scene like a brick of bottle rockets. Playing venues the front-couple had only recently become old enough to drink in (and having to make special allowances for the then-underage Hawken), they soon established themselves as the Buckeye State’s most exciting trio since, depending, perhaps, on your own age, Times New Viking or fIREHOSE (who were, after all, only one-third from Ohio). After a self-released debut, they turned out a second full-length, The Beat Goes On, and an EP of remixes - featuring contributions by both Sonic Boom and Laraaji - for Philadelphia's stalwart No Quarter.
Their forthcoming full-length will be their first for Third Man; also, like their home state, full of heart and damn near as crucial to reckon with. The band will head to the UK and EU next month for a string of dates in support of the signing. Watch this space for US tour news and expect to hear new music soon.
