DISINIBLUD - Disiniblud

There was a moment, roughly in the middle of the 2000s, when the ecstatic crescendos of post-rock (in its most widespread incarnation of the early millennium) were reinterpreted with a playful spirit and a penchant for choral vocals and folk strumming. A universe whose big bang can, for simplicity's sake, be traced back to the chiming bells of "Takk…" and whose expansion has left a deep mark on contemporary pop. From that broad trajectory, lesser-trodden paths keep branching off, and it's along one of these, venturing deep into a nocturnal yet welcoming forest, that the self-titled debut of the duo Disiniblud moves - the project formed by Rachika Nayar and Nina Keith.

After a long phase of mutual online appreciation of each other's music, the meeting that sparked the partnership between the two transgender artists took place in a Brooklyn park, a corner of New York that both have chosen as their artistic refuge. Nayar, a guitarist and producer with two acclaimed albums under her belt, loves to warp the sounds of her electric guitar through every sort of manipulation, launching them into orbit via rave-like electronic ascents. Keith, a composer and multi-instrumentalist, released a record in 2019 suspended between contemporary classical, ambient and field recordings, inspired by her experience with EMDR therapy. The result of their collaboration is an enthusiastic celebration, brimming with wonder and emotion, of the processes of metamorphosis and healing, as well as of the ongoing exploration of one's own shifting self and of the bond forged with a kindred soul. Between childlike astonishment and stunned heartbeats, the songs of "Disiniblud" become magical evocations of a possible elsewhere, where identities are free to transform and re-create themselves along a continuous spectrum, like the rainbow that results from the chromatic dispersion of a beam of light through a prism.

The instrumental tracks crafted by Nayar and Keith were enriched, through email exchanges, with sung contributions from numerous kindred-spirit artists (sometimes nothing more than pseudonyms concealing Disiniblud themselves). It's Julianna Barwick, for instance, a sorceress of vocal spells in imaginary languages, who lends a hand to open the record with the eloquent invitation to "let go" of "Give-upping". Although the underlying texture of broken chirps initially recalls the glitch songwriting of Bon Iver's "22, A Million" more than Sigur Rós, the influence of the Reykjavik band is not long in making itself felt: when a cascade of looped piano notes bursts onto the scene, like a swarm of joyful children running to hide in the corners of a garden, it's as if the incipit of "()" had been remixed at triple speed by Dan Deacon.

The soft 7/8 patter of the following "Blue Rags, Raging Wind" confirms the duo's declared fascination with the Icelandic scene, winking at Múm. And with the orchestrated climax of "Serpentine", Disiniblud land one of the record's most pinpoint strikes: from a hushed prayer resting on a circular arpeggio, the track explodes into a breathless electronic ascent, with panting voices and digital crackles fracturing in every direction.

Among the album's ingenious folktronic contraptions, the most dazzling is probably the music-box carousel of the title track (whose video lays bare the imagery underpinning the record). In these small caskets of emotion, Nayar and Keith's sensibilities merge to the point of becoming inseparable: the ambient detours are never all-consuming ("No More To See"), the guitar stretches either drape backdrops in flowing folds ("Traces In The Window", where Jónsi and co. still echo) or embroider following the lesson of Explosions In The Sky ("Whole30 Fight Club").

In reconciling the power of imagination over the body with the power of the body over the mind, the queer utopia of "Disiniblud" acquires singular healing properties, capable of thawing even the iciest walls of anguish with its warmth (this writer's personal experience can attest to it, during the duo's live performance at the Rewire 2025 festival). These thaumaturgic gifts perhaps stem from the mysterious being gracing the cover, apparently a dragon's head that lodged for a while in Nayar's garage. Although it's reasonable to assume it's a nod to the famous Luckdragon Falkor, made known to many through the film adaptation of "The NeverEnding Story", the true hidden reference buried in the record's grooves to Michael Ende's masterpiece novel might be another one. In the book's final chapters, the protagonist Bastian, emerging from a disastrous bout of megalomaniac delusions of omnipotence, is welcomed and guided back to his childlike nature by the Aquamarine Lady, a plant-like entity who dwells in the House of Change, and is told by her of a prophecy: a time will come when humans will bring love into Fantastica, uniting the two worlds into one. Who knows if this is the horizon that Disiniblud, in the secrecy of their colourful dreams, hope to bring us closer to, little by little.

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13/12/2025