The title of Matt Evans’ new record, forthcoming June 25 on Whatever’s Clever Records, sums up the experience of loss in one poignant word: touchless. Written and recorded in the wake of his partner Devra Freelander’s passing, touchless conveys Evans’ ruminations on grief, love, presence and absence by way of compositional couplets, incorporating piano, violin, upright bass, tenor sax, analog synthesizer and field recordings.
The end result is utterly breathtaking. Evans’ compositions are imbued with an immense depth of emotion – plangent piano chords express a sense of longing while resonant harmonic drone underscores string and wind instrumentation engaging in elegiac interplay with ephemeral ambient sound.
Today, we have the honor of premiering the music video for “Firn” – an achingly beautiful piece from touchless. The video was directed and shot in VR by Gracelee Lawrence, a NY-based sculptor and digital artist whose work “explores the relationships between food, the body and technology.” Lawrence’s visual accompaniment to “Firn” takes the viewer on a POV expedition through many layers of brilliantly colored three-dimensional shapes. A green, brain-like orb acts as a recurring focal point as we delve through kaleidoscopic wormholes into foreign virtual environments. Lawrence effectively interprets the thematic narrative of touchless through a phenomenological lens, utilizing VR as a creative tool for the representation of transcendentalist gestures. Watch below:
touchless is out 25/06/21 on Whatever’s Clever Records. Pre-order it here.