FENTON - Pup

Electronic sprite Dan Abrams presents himself under the pseudonym Fenton.

With his work as a sound sculptor, he was one of the first to fuse the aesthetics and sensibility of digital technologies with the legacy left by pioneers of ambient music such as Brian Eno, David Parsons and Robert Rich.

Abrams began making music at a young age, riding the exponential development of software for electronic manipulation, and went on to release landmark albums such as "Stream", under his own name, and "Frame" under the moniker Shuttle 358.

This new album marks a further step in his journey through space, across billions of stars, through a tide of dazzling lights.

"Pup" is built around a single instrument: the guitar. Virtually every track is focused on stripping that instrument's sound down to the bone, coating it in glitch stratifications, mechanical excrescences and sinuous drones.

"Bunny" bears out these impressions with a commendable blend of guitar patterns looped cyclically at a steady pace, embellished with a prolonged, artificial tail. Other chords overlap, laying decoupled, uneven notes across different planes of execution. A continuous sonic flow unfolds with pleasant consistency, while microscopic timbral grit forms a highly fastidious backdrop.

Next comes "Neon Giraffe". A booming substrate, made up of billows of diffuse noise, provides the backing for the rhythmic layering of a battered guitar, this time more drawn-out and ethereal. A gradual softening of the jagged edges leads to a calm, silent finale.

In "Once Upon a Forest" the pace is even more subdued and hushed; "Gentle Meten" plunges a whirlwind of broken, jagged strings into a sticky, voluminous molasses; "Boned Gouth" relaxes the mood even further, weaving imperceptible soundscapes, almost an ode to silence.

"Wageless" is a natural mutation of "Bunny", where various notes are placed wrongly, out of place, creating a deeply disorienting atmosphere: dreamlike, peaceful experimentation. "Brother Blueberry" is less conceptual and more tangible. A chord arriving from boundless skies is born and grows, proliferating and expanding as the seconds pass. A confluence of concrete sounds in the background helps build a dreamy aura that shrouds the track's five minutes in mysticism. Playful little bleeps are doled out with meticulous precision.

Much the same goes for the following "Many Blades Of Grass Ago". Once again, a haze of golden chords is speckled with digital trinkets, infinitesimal tears and pauses that seem to stretch on forever.

"Forver Awkwand" ramps up the "granularity" with which the notes of that much loved/hated guitar are broken down. We find ourselves inside a complete and fascinating deconstruction. Field recordings periodically intervene, lending an overall touch of naturalness.

The record closes with a minimal ride in "Pup Is Seeing Now", amid languid organs, celestial fragmentations and a touch of classicism applied to an otherwise alien sound.

A record for precious, melancholy moments, solitary nights to spend with these shreds of silent noise, priceless moments. A prickly, distant work, hard to grasp. The moment it catches you, it will become an affliction that gets under your skin.

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30/04/2026