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'Brutalist' marks the return of prodigious electronic producer Robert Logan, with his first full album on Slowfoot since 2016’s 'Flesh Decomposed'. Jumping from clinical dub techno to ambient, IDM and electro to leftfield electroacoustic experiments, Logan’s usual electronic / symphonic inspirations and ambitions are felt heavily yet are married to something new - a strange, driving minimalism sits at the core of this body of work.

'Brutalist' is a potent, labyrinthine experience, containing 24 tracks recorded and produced over a 13-year period. This is ugly sounds sounding beautiful, impossible combinations working as music. Massive, monolithic structures emerging through rain, compositions demanding simultaneous introversion and dancing in underground bunkers. Music for after the fallout - a future reborn, remade from the elements.

Just as Brutalism emerged in the aftermath of World War Two as an architectural statement of positive intent, an affirmation of the potential of human endeavour and of rebuilding the future after the horror and destruction that preceded it, so 'Brutalist' is a testament to the indomitable soul's capacity to rebuild amidst profound devastation. Robert Logan, faced with a crucible of severe chronic health difficulties, transmuted the pain into finishing an album, emerging with a retrospective work that reflects the spirit of architectural Brutalism – stark, raw, yet strangely beautiful. Amongst other sufferings, Logan suffered a devastating sound accident at the beginning of 2020 and spent lockdown battling catastrophic tinnitus, and this record is his attempt to revive from and appropriate the new difficulty.

The album was born from an obsession with making impossible combinations work as music, like the sound of concrete tripping the light fantastic. Its rhythms are elastic and forceful, with a penetrating physical presence about them, and the album walks a special tightrope between hypnotism and electrifying surprise. The functional elements of noise are teased out, manipulated and celebrated, divisions between old musical and new digital elements dissolved, and something fresh has been rebuilt out of sonic destruction - something purer, raw and stripped of any apologies in the face of the trauma.

From the apocalyptic, filmic soundworlds of 'Seven Bowls', where the cries of sea creatures echo through aquatic ruins, to the stark, minimalist beats of 'Minimizing', which resonate like rhythmic pulses against cold cement, the album delivers an explorative, diverse and captivating sonic experience over its two hour duration. Tracks like 'Free Spikes' delve into more radical realms of deconstructed experimentation, marked by fierce collapsing polyrhythms, while 'The Dead Hand' offers up something more approachable, a dark groove that brings Massive Attack to mind, interjected with brooding film noir horn arrangements. Album opener 'Microstates' recalls the stark and hazy urban jitter of Burial’s first LP.

This latest addition to Logan’s oeuvre may be his most daring and experimental yet. It is infused with the same exploratory DNA as his inspirations - ranging from Aphex Twin and 20th-century classical music to Autechre, Photek, and more - but his sound remains undeniably his own.

In Logan’s own words: “'Brutalist' is inspired by a continual excitement in rethinking the raw building blocks of music and sound. I think there’s a tension zone really engaging music occupies - the delicate but tough, tight but loose, deep but not overworked, extreme sounding but not harsh on ears paradox. That holding of the space between seemingly impossible sonic opposites is what I love most in music.”

A mysterious, unassuming artist, Logan released his first solo album 'Cognessence', aged 19, to critical acclaim in 2007. Mary Anne Hobbs described the music on his debut as “absolutely outstanding… impossible to quantify”, with BBC Experimental calling Logan “…something of a prodigy… a man that is already showing a maturity and a musical/textural understanding that many simply never find.” Since then, Logan has carved out an unconventional career dictated by his ambition to explore the mental spaces sound can conjure. Aside from his impressive slew of solo albums and EP’s, he has made two albums with ambient guru Steve Roach and worked on album projects with heavyweights such as Grace Jones, Brian Eno, Morcheeba, and, most recently, John Grant on his latest album 'The Art of The Lie'.

He has also pursued a successful parallel career composing music for the screen, often alongside producer Ivor Guest, a long-term collaboration which has yielded a few Oscar and Grammy nominations along the way. His most recent endeavours include ongoing collaboration with conceptual artist Kristina Buch for installations at the Akademie Der Künste, lecturing on the history of electronic music at the Staatliche Akademie der Bildenden Künste Karlsruhe, and as composer for An Orange from Jaffa (winner of various awards, including the Grand Prize at the Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival) and HBO's 'Agents of Chaos and a.k.a Mr. Chow'.

PRESS:

“London-based composer and artist Robert Logan returns with Brutalist, a profound two-hour narrative of sonic exploration on Slowfoot Records. With 24 tracks spanning clinical dub techno, IDM, ambient, and electroacoustic experimentation, Brutalist is both vast and meticulously detailed—a stunning fusion of minimalism and cinematic texture.” [Rendah Mag]

“Following notable collaborations with Steve Roach, Brian Eno, and Grace Jones, ‘Brutalist’ emerges as a crooked monolith – a towering, gunmetal-grey edifice of sound, 24 tracks unfurling like a vertiginous ascent through the cold, concrete stairwells of a dystopian high-rise. Each composition reveals a sharp, minimalist symmetry, crafted for a world inhabited by the fundamental segments of humanity. This album plunges into vast, cinematic soundscapes, where dense layers of steamy ambient swirl around leftfield rhythms, while fragmented IDM pulses sketch the architecture of a hyper-connected, cybernetic mind.” [Inverted Audio]

“Brutalist is a twenty-four track album that forms a powerfully organic collection; bridging the gap between the organic and the manufactured world, man and nature, and man and machine. Too often as an artist grows they’ll explore newer styles and trends, becoming a musical tourist while dipping their toes into deep and unknown waters with middling success. Robert Logan is no tourist, but an adventurer who is unafraid to get close to the local flora and fauna wherever his music takes him. As a result, Brutalist is easily in my top 10 albums of 2024 (while its release is set of early January of 2025) at first listen and a welcome addition to Robert Logan’s already impressive discography.” [Igloo Mag]

“If you're not averse to the genre and don't shy away from a bit of chaos and experimentation, 'Brutalist' could be your soundtrack for 2025. It's an album that makes you dance, disturbs and fascinates - and reminds us that even in the darkest of times, something new can emerge. A monolithic masterpiece!” [Medienonverter]

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