Image: Hyperdub
Harnessing the potential for sound to literally shape space is a rare skill, yet it’s one that seems to come organically for London based composer, producer and DJ Lee Gamble. As a sonic sculptor, Gamble creates the sort of work that feels three dimensional in its scope; pieces of sound art that become visceral in their intellect. He’s treated sound very much as a sculptor would clay or marble, chipping away at his material and extracting from it treasure troves of textures, angles and curves. The body of work this produces has also followed the path of fine art, being driven by conceptual and intellectual musings on philosophy, culture and politics. Electronica for Gamble is the opportunity to explore the dichotomy between man and machine, in a way that his music becomes a commentary on the state of modern human existence. His recent work has found a gallery in label Hyperdub, for whom he has been crafting an ongoing triptych of albums that explore these concepts. Hyperpassive arrives as the first single from the final instalment in the series, A Million Pieces Of You, which is due on September 10th via Hyperdub.
Pre-order A Million Pieces of You here
Hyperpassive immediately distinguishes A Million Pieces Of You from the sound of Gamble’s previous two Hyperdub entries. While 2019’s In A Paraventral Scale and last year’s Exhaust leaned into the revving sounds of machinery to produce intensely serpentine and aggressive sound sculptures, Hyperpassive is a quieter creation that ruminates on socialisation, suggesting A Million Pieces Of You will be a body of work concerned more with humanism. Composed of lush, stuttering pads and bright, piercing stabs, Hyperpassive finds a sense of warmth in the austerity of Gamble’s synthetic medium. The track opens with fluttering, syncopated pads that dance like scattered sunlight, before contorting into a filtered, ambient buzz against a kinetic rhythm. The heart of Hyperpassive reveals itself in the track’s final act, as swatches of the sound of everyday life are layered beneath the electronics. Human voices softly chatter and mingle with each other, the familiar but now distant noise of socialisation underscoring the bright sparkle of Gamble’s sonic collage. The cadence of Gamble’s sounds continuously reach for the ether, and the effect is one of giddy optimism. Gamble has explained how A Million Pieces Of You is very much an album created in isolation and to reckon with the feelings that arose during this time; loneliness, loss and a sense of burnout. Gamble’s response is to recall times of the past, a reminder of what life looks like beyond the current moment when human connection is our driving force.
Watch the music video for Hyperpassive, created by animator Clifford Sage below.
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