SPECIMENS - ‘INTERSECTIONS’
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Specimens (aka Alex Ives) returns with “Intersections”, a collaborative new album out 20th May on First Terrace Records. It follows up on his 2018 album ‘In The Dust Of Idols’ - which was selected as one of FACT magazines ‘Ambient Albums of the Year’ - and recent feature on the Ninja Tune imprint Ahead of Our Time alongside Ryuichi Sakamoto, Julianna Barwick, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, A Winged Victory For The Sullen, Skee mask, Suzanne Ciani, Helena Hauff and more for the ambient compilation ‘@0’.
Ives’s new album ‘Intersections’ is an record deliberately exploring the beauty in artistic collaboration, something Ives holds dear to his heart “I wanted to write an album as a kind of ode to all the wonderful little exchanges we have through our life with other humans & specifically for me through music, in touring, playing shows and even as simple as connections made online I have had the privilege to make so many friends and cross paths with some wonderful artists I wanted to do a record inspired by this”. The title ‘Intersections’ alludes to the idea of a giant network of roads, flight lanes, venues, hostels & inboxes that we are all constantly travelling on and along these pathways we intersect with others, each on our own individual journeys, and the tracks on this album are expressions of those interactions.
The album features Peter Broderick (Erased Tapes), Midori Hirano (Sonic Pieces), Benoit Pioulard (Kranky) & Emilie Levienaise-Farrouch (130701) who have contributed in their own unique ways to weave their sonic fingerprints into the fabric of Specimens ambient canvases. The track ‘The Illusion of Eternal Bliss’ is a very poignant example of capturing an exchange between two people, with Alex & Emilie re-visiting the South London church in which they first met for a show to record a piece on the organ, of this experience Alex says “it was one of the most fun experiences I have had recording with a friend, Emilie is such a talented person and our approaches are fairly different but I think we came together really well on this track and had a lot of fun in the process, which is really what is all about capturing these little moments like sonic photographs”.
