Sombre slowcore rolls in lengthy outings, moody with interesting electronic tinges

Whispers of the enigmatic Alberta musician audry have circulated throughout the communities wedged deep in the undergrowth of the music internet these past few years. Presenting a style that meshes glitch, IDM, slowcore with an experimental gait, audry is a musician who is hard to pin down. As a listener goes through her discography, many different influences emerge in a number of different ways from release to release. With this newest record, Kitsch and the Foible, audry’s talent for electronic music meets notable forays into slowcore, forming an introspective look into her turbulent emotions. 

Droning on through dubbed-out delays, the album opener Waiting immerses the listener into the vast expanse of sea depicted on the Kitsch’s artwork. Guitar strums ring out into this isolated seascape. Slowly the song begins to add layers of languid drums and quiet synths as audry’s creative process slowly boots up. Mumbled vocals are buried in the mix, with an occasional flash of clarity. Phrases such as “Coyotes flank me from each ditch alongside of the highway” and “no end to the horizon” drive home a sense of loneliness and isolation present throughout the entire album. Waiting develops on previous droning rock songs by audry, furthering the sounds found on the Vampiric Premonitions EP released at the start of this year.

Jarring listeners more acquainted with the previous track’s rock timbres, track two, Spinning, introduces audry’s electronic tendencies. Starting from a place of simplicity equal to the guitar strums that start off the previous track, digital bells gently float around the listener’s head. Suddenly, a cutting digital bass jumps out of the centre channel. Sampled drums hit through the mix as a muffled singing sample drifts between the left and right. The textures of these first two tracks differ significantly. But even with track one’s straightforward slowcore rock contrasting track two’s banging electronic backbone, both follow a similar structure. Each track ups the intensity over their runtimes by adding myriad layers to a developing texture, leaving the listener submerged. These two songs stick to their respective sound palettes the most, however the songs to come on the record bring these disparate parts into one whole.

A quick rolling sample of what sounds like the ident of a news broadcast opens Swerving, introducing the epic collage influence found in audry’s alias integral. This type of digital low fidelity distortion is a staple of her catalogue. Gradually morphing into something resembling an alternative rock song, Swerving takes the listener on a chaotic journey. This immersion is helped by the song’s 10-minute runtime, lulling listeners deep into a trance as euphoric sound laps at clearer instrumentation till suddenly they are sucked out of it by the intense anxiety of the searing synths closing out the song.

Meshing all the ideas presented thus far, Knocking’s driven rhythm perfectly juxtaposes audry’s quiet vocals, often delivered in a mumble that sits between guarded and nonplussed. The artist's lamentations are on display in the lyrics. Calling out, audry receives no answer to a message. The recipient’s phone is offline. Isolation and loneliness pervade. audry says she’ll “go to the mountains” and asks if “all this will change in time”. The lyrics connect the song’s subject to artifice: the glow of a computer screen, smartphones, digital clicks and buzzes. Conversely, audry is associated with nature, mountains and cerulean orange skies. She asks whether the recipient of her message sees these things too, desperate to be understood.

Closing out the record, the 6-minute epic titled Literature Only waves goodbye to the listener in a unique melding of slushy droning tones and a cathartic sludgy garage rock refrain. Mapping out her world, audry claims she’s been all over, which for her means both ends of Canada. This limited worldview is exactly what is so successfully conveys on this record. Is life kitsch? Is audry the foible? These questions run through the listener’s mind as a clip from s2 e1 of the show Nirvanna the Band the Show is played in the background and the song dives deeper and deeper into noise and drone. 

audry’s newest record Kitsch and the Foible paints a vivid picture of isolation, loneliness and angst through jaded lyrics wishing for someone to return, and wistful acknowledgments of personal flaws and friendlessness. While audry will almost certainly put out at least one more record by the end of 2024 (as made obvious by her extremely prolific release schedule) Kitsch and the Foible leans the furthest into slowcore and rock that audry has ever gone. One only has to look at highlights from the record such as Spinning or Knocking to see this new direction certainly pays off. While it is impossible to tell if audry will go on to evolve the sounds on this record or drift off in another bold direction, this record illuminates a creative journey which will only continue to morph and build upon itself long into the future.