Our prolonged collective isolation has created a time where the imaginary has become a preferred alternative to the real. Spaces, identities and relationships have all shifted onto the online realm, and while we may be attending the same virtual club events or communicating with one another on a group chat, we are starved of the tangible, relational reality that we were once accustomed to. The lack of shared experience and space has only emphasized the boring stagnant state, affecting our sense of time as days slur monotonously into a jumble.
Polish artist ehh hahah’s single “zwykla sobota” from their upcoming project for Warsaw’s glamour.label, entitled house ze skrzypcami w tle, is a blend of folksy melodic layers with unexpected instrumental quips. It is a piece that is playful and dynamic, winking at its audience throughout as it twists from friendly elevator music towards a cacophonic finale that retains structure while evading definition. The percussive samples applied throughout the song act like a ticking clock; while they initially ground the ever-evolving world ehh hahah has shaped, they also begin to slip away from their role as time-keeper, subtly adding and subtracting time as they please. The pulse dissolves into the distant chaos.
The faultiness of the measurements of time encapsulates our current reality, while “zwykla sobota” provides a line of goofball positivity, a moment of levity as counterweight to the heaviness surrounding us. ehh hahah uses humour as a launchpoint for experimentation and the results are a collection of tracks which keep you guessing what the joke is. The project is all a “big misunderstanding”, and we mean that as a compliment.
by Oscar Chiu.
house ze skrzypcami w tle is out 24/06/20 digitally w/ limited edition booklet containing 28 pages of “contexts, backgrounds, diaries, rare photos, diagrams, hopes & anxieties.” Pre-order it here.
Video: Julek Ploski
Artwork: Rafal Dominik
Mastering: Duy Gebord