Introducing: Optic Sink

Optic Sink are Magic Kids' Ben Bauermeister and NOTS' Natalie Hoffmann whose synth-punk debut is out now on Goner Records. 

Here's The Scoop...

Optic Sink’s Natalie Hoffmann (NOTS) creates a musical paradox: an endeavor that doesn’t seem to belong to any particular time or place. She constructs with sounds that are synthesized and stripped down, yet bristling with urgency and brutalist emotion. With percussionist Ben Bauermeister (Magic Kids, Toxie, A55 Conducta) by her side, the two set up camp on the post-punk side of the minimal electronic scene. 

Their S/T debut – out now on Goner Records – was preceded by release of the “Personified” single, a Trumptopian critique delivered over a new wave chase theme. “Personified is a chaotic reflection on the far-reaching shadows of the dystopia we're living in. The contrasting textures in the song underline the tension between human and machine, and where that line is blurred,” Hoffmann describes. 

Optic Sink eschew computers for a warmer, decidedly human soundscape. Hoffmann’s power and the tension she generates between human and machine, evokes Maria – the rebellious teacher-turned-Maschinenmensch in Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, and Ripley, the swaggering, sacrificing heroine of Ridley Scott’s Alien franchise. Dadaism and the Bauhaus movement could both be cited as influences; so might the existentialist philosophy of Simone de Beauvoir and the jump-cuts of Maya Deren. 

These are eight fully defined, atmospheric collages crafted with plenty of room for Hoffmann to play and test an artillery of sounds. “It’s about the evasive search for comfort: the human need to have freedom from pain, and for ease in a fixed system made to exploit,” Hoffmann says of the album, which she partially wrote during an extended musical residency at the Memphis creative complex Crosstown Arts. 

"I lost two people who were inexpressibly important to me in 2018 and 2019, and it completely derailed me from working on music at all for a while. After I was able to focus on music again, the solitary and meditative endeavor of writing songs for Optic Sink became a form of therapy for me and a way of working through the grief and shock of these losses. So as much as this record is informed by the repercussions of our current political climate, it's also shaped by a looming sense of loss." 

Optic Sink defy categories, shape-shifting from cold wave to psychedelia to distorted noise rock. In the process—which frequently occurs in a single song—they claim unchartered territory as they cathartically fragment and reassemble sounds, concepts, and verbal constructs. The conflict they define is life in America in 2020, finding beauty in the journey despite what the final resolution might be. 

Get a copy of Optic Sink's debut album from Goner right here. Watch a recent live performance followed by the video for "Personified"

Single of the Week: Manateees

Charging out from behind the drum kit, Abe White (Oscars, True Sons Of Thunder) has created Manateees with pals Charms on buckets and Keith on bass (the instrument, not the fish) to unleash an all new Memphis punk rock nastiness upon an unsuspecting world. With their new Cat Food seven-inch for Goner Records (listen below).

Watch out for new Manateees releases on Tic Tac Totally and Pelican Pow Wow Records!

Facebook : www.facebook.com/memphismanateees
Bandcamp : www.manateees.bandcamp.com


Cat Food by Manateees
  
Order the Cat Food single direct from Goner Records:
BLUE VINYL (limited edition) - http://www.goner-records.com/cart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=4&products_id=10528
BLACK VINYL - http://www.goner-records.com/cart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=4&products_id=10527

New film spotlights Memphis DIY music scene

Watch the trailer to Robert Allen Parker & Nan Hackman's forthcoming documentary below

"I Can't Wait" by Star & Micey
LINKS
Meanwhile In Memphis FB page
Goner Records http://www.goner-records.com/
Star & Micey http://starandmicey.com/

Simply Saucer gets Segall-ized

Whether it was part of a clever marketing plan or mere cosmic coincidence, Ty Segall's decision to record and release a cover of Simply Saucer's Bullet Proof Nothing from which Liz Worth swiped the song's memorable refrain for the title for her recently published oral history of Toronto punk Treat Me Like Dirt (Bongo Beat) seems remarkably fortuitous for everyone involved.

Segall's appropriately raunchy rendition of Edgar Breau's Kenilworth Klassic appears on his fab new Caesar seven-inch single just issued by the Memphis-based Goner Records on limited-run clear and black vinyl which you can order directly from Goner right here. If you'd rather have the MP3s, they're available here. I was about to throw in a comment about how such seemingly coincidental occurrences rarely happen entirely by chance in the record business until I realized that I was wearing a Goner Records t-shirt as I was writing this post. Oh well.    
Although I still prefer the Saucer's original version of Bullet Proof Nothing off their astounding Cyborgs Revisited album, Segall's Dolled-up homage to the hard-luck Hamiltonian heavyweights is a heartwarming gesture nonetheless.

Bullet Proof Nothing by Simply Saucer

LINKS
Ty Segall http://www.myspace.com/tysegall
Simply Saucer http://www.myspace.com/OfficialSimplySaucer
http://www.simplysaucer.com
Edgar Breau http://www.edgarbreau.com
Bongo Beat http://bongobeat.com/LizWo_TreMeLi_bk.php
Liz Worth http://www.lizworth.com