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From the Sea to the Stars

Teen Daze blasts off on new EP, 'A Silent Planet.'

Alex Hudson 1 Sep 2011TheTyee.ca

Alex Hudson writes for various music publications and runs a blog called Chipped Hip.

A couple of years ago, it seemed as though all of indiedom was gripped by a sudden beach fixation. Artists like Wavves, Best Coast and Washed Out concocted sunny tributes to the sand and the sea, swaddling their rough-hewn home recordings in a haze of fuzz and reverb.

Abbotsford songwriter Teen Daze (who also goes by the mononym Jamison) was not immune to the lure of the coastline craze. His debut EP, 2010's Four More Years, channeled the feel-good sounds of summer with synth-steeped nostalgia and bleary chillwave charm.

Then, just a few months later, Jamison returned to the seaside with Beach Dreams, an overt tribute to contemporary indie pop and its tendency to romanticize a life of sun-drenched relaxation. Brimming with crackly guitars and Beach Boys-indebted vocal harmonies, the EP was a catchy but derivative addition to an already cluttered lo-fi scene.

Still, these early releases earned Teen Daze an impressive buzz, with coverage from Pitchfork, Gorilla Vs. Bear and Stereogum. It was uncertain, however, whether his blog-friendly, beach-oriented material would translate into career longevity.

Luckily for us, Jamison has prevailed in recent months, branching out with a series of diverse projects. Under the pseudonym Two Bicycles, he delved into ambient instrumental music, landing somewhere between down-tempo electronica and starry-eyed new age. (The Two Bicycles moniker actually dates back several years to 2007 according to MySpace -- but the cassette full-length The Ocean didn't arrive until this April.) He also founded Cultus Vibes, an online label that has been putting out free digital music since early 2011. Meanwhile, he's been rolling out remixes for a wide range of artists (Said the Whale, You Say Party, Matt & Kim, etc.).

His latest foray is the most exciting yet. On Sept. 13, Waaga Records will release A Silent Planet, a six-song collection that marries Jamison's dreamy pop sensibilities with intergalactic ambience and twinkling electro atmosphere.

The disc was inspired by the novel Out of the Silent Planet, written by Narnia author and Christian apologist C.S. Lewis. Jamison first read the book -- which is about a man who gets kidnapped and taken to an alien planet -- during a 2008 sojourn to the Swiss Alps. The story of a journey to a foreign land mirrored the songwriter's own experience, and three years later, the novel acted as the thematic underpinning of these expansive, futuristic tracks.

There's no mistaking the sci-fi influence on opener "Surface," a swooshing synthscape augmented by delay-soaked guitars. After a 30-second intro, the track warps dizzily upwards, a "Space Oddity"-style trick that imitates the sound of rocket blasting off.

From there, the rest of A Silent Planet is similarly trippy. The distantly echoing vocals of "It Calls Me Under" sound as if they're being sung from deep within a black hole, while "The Harvest" re-imagines an early morning Greyhound bus ride as lonely voyage through the abyss.

The EP ends with "Malacandra," which takes its name from the planet in Lewis's novel. At nearly six minutes long, it contains no discernible melody or lyrics. Instead, it's a heady swirl of cosmic synths, distant voices and auditory space dust that sounds about a billion light years away from his aquatically-inclined past work.

With a release like this under his belt, Teen Daze has proven that he's much more than just another chillwaver. And considering his prolific and unpredictable output in recent months, it's anyone's guess where Jamison's unbounded musical journey will take him next.  [Tyee]

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