While production has advanced in notable ways in recent memory, the art of composition is something that should never disappear from music making. Every now and then, we need a track that reminds us that a properly orchestrated series of layered tracks is all we really need for a classic to be born. Qualia wobbles through a fanciful trip of pop and psychedelia in a musical space that truly feels like anything can happen in the track Time Laughs. Boasting remarkable structural similarities to gentle giants of the music world like the Magnetic Fields, Time Laughs will get in your head to the point of lapses in memory and a feeling of unexplainable ease of self.
This track feels like a truly unique culmination of styles that vary from Latin percussion to random bits of bluesy guitar to pitchy soundscapes created by vocal wails that seem unnaturally expressive. These all somehow come together in a way that isn’t unnerving, nor is it perfectly together. This sort of detuned emotion is reminiscent of some Avant Gard titans that would make St. Vincent herself turn her head and smile at the pleasant motions of Qualia. Whatever spell is cast on those who listen to this track; you may wish to try it for yourself. If time indeed laughs, we may as well be in on the joke and laugh along.
-Paul Weyer
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