Serious Thinkers Chatroom: Nicolas Jaar, “Telas”

Digging into electronic boundary-pusher Nicolas Jaar’s third LP of 2020. 

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Welcome to the debut of a new feature here at Noise Floor that I’d like to think of as a sort of deconstructed record review. My longtime friend, music discourse sparring partner and former college radio cohost Mike Doub and I will be taking on new releases of particular interest in virtual-conversation format during a synchronized listen. We urge you to join in as grissom9922 (myself) and mike d (more self-explanatory) tackle Nicolas Jaar’s rather breathtaking Telas for our maiden voyage.

grissom9922:

so, big year for this dude

his second LP under his own name and third in total

mike d:

insomuch as anyone this year is having a “big” one

grissom9922:

yeah, 2020 has been a weird one for new releases. not a ton of things having the same impact they might in a normal year of release cycles & touring

mike d:

i wanted to ask you about that going into this. as a fellow narrative-minded music listener. it’s weird to project value onto objects whose broader impact is more obscured than ever, yeah?

grissom9922:

I think it’s a really strange time to be taking in new music generally, with this combo of releases planned last year, things getting delayed, artists making records in quarantine, etc.

not to mention a lot of listening habits being sort of upended

I know that’s been the case for me- not having a commute to listen has shaken up how I’m consuming things

mike d:

to that effect, i feel sort of fraudulent talking about new records because the way i experience them is so personal; this is a record i listened to while making dinner, this is a record i listened to on a walk outside, etc.

the meaning of these objects is already conditional, but more so than ever in our current circumstances

grissom9922:

right, this extremely weird year is heightening those associations

like, I have “running records” now, so some of the fast/loud/short releases from this year have gotten more play than usual

mike d:

with that in mind, the three records nicolas jaar has released this year seem weirdly attuned to 2020 living to me and present an “arc” of sorts

with the against all logic compilation 2017-2019 being this collection of bangers in frenetic overdrive (like last year’s blanck mass lp) and the two subsequent records released under his own name being more desolate, fractured

grissom9922:

yeah, I can totally hear that

especially in the second record feeling particularly ominous and dropping around the beginning of quarantine

mike d:

let’s start with those first two records. what do you think of them, and what’s been your perception of nicolas jaar to date?

grissom9922:

my real intro to him as a solo artist was sirens back in 2016, which I loved after also being very into that darskide record he made with dave harrington

and I recall you tipping me off to the previous AAL compilation, which is a totally different side of him

and I feel like this most recent AAL release being followed up with cenizas really illustrates his range

to that end, I found cenizas a bit impenetrable

but like, in a way where I feel challenged by it and want to keep listening

mike d:

i felt similarly about cenizas – a bit suffocating/blown-out, but in a purposeful way for sure

the against all logic album release that came out in february was more immediate for me, and something that’s had a lot of replay value as a running soundtrack. he’s always toggled between these two modes – tuneful/driving vs. abtract/searching – and those first two 2020 records really embody that duality

i found telas to be operating more within the latter camp, but also distinctly “beyond” the nuclear fallout vibes of cenizas

grissom9922:

agreed, it feels almost like a more hopeful response to cenizas to me

if that record is nuclear fallout, this one is the sound of abandoning the scorched earth in search of something new

not to get too “brent dicrescenzo on kid a” about it

but it has a very cinematic feel to me

mike d:

it’s similar to how jaar himself describes this record, as a “reconstruction.” though i’m reticent to take an artist’s word for it re: what their music means, i think his description is born out in the record’s assembly

these different pieces clicking together unexpectedly into an overall shape that feels alien, misshapen, “new”

i love how the record begins with this woodwind pulse that then gets blasted all to hell by sound scraping – the feeling of the record and his 2020 records that we’ve been describing in a nutshell

grissom9922:

yeah, there’s a real physicality to that opening

on that note, should we start listening?

mike d:

let’s listen

mike d:

something else that’s really excited me about this record is how it really brings jaar’s sound design skills to the fore. the timbre and location of different sounds within my ears is consistently panoramic

it’s a familiar approach from the nymphs compilation and his recent soundtrack for the movie ema, but telas to me represents an evolution of his skills in that arena

grissom9922:

absolutely, the production is a standout element of this

it’s very much a headphones record

feel like I should mention at the outset here, this record is kind of intimidating in its abstract shape, these monolithic 10-15 minute tracks, all with similar titles

mike d:

i suspect this was originally conceived as one hour-long piece, like a very slow/patient dj set

grissom9922:

exactly, I was gonna say, it feels like it demands to be listened to as the full front-to-back experience

mike d:

it doesn’t feel like a record that can be thrown on casually, which – without getting into the meta-narratives too quickly – may have dulled the reception to telas?

on top of being its creator’s third release in a year where attention is demanded from many different places (personal, professional, spiritual)

grissom9922:

yeah I think that’s probably true, I didn’t hear a ton of buzz about this and I feel like that could stem from 2020 not being a year where a lot of people have the patience for a record like this

mike d:

do you have patience for a record like this?

grissom9922:

2020 has forced me to slow down in a lot of ways, and I think that’s made me a more patient listener in some sense

which is maybe why I feel the most connected to this of his 3 releases this year

I’ve been listening to a lot of jazz since march, and this record has some jazz-like qualities in its arrangements I think

mike d:

it’s my favorite as well, and maybe the 2020 record i’ve most enjoyed

definitely agree that it’s got jazzier qualities than usual for a nicolas jaar record. the way it’ll suddenly lurch into a bounce/groove, or the way the harsh honking can be strangely tuneful come to mind

that a lot of my music listening is happening at home is for sure a factor in my enjoyment of a record like this, but i’m also so engrossed by something that’s creating a new sound and lexicon for how sounds go together

[pitchfork review of kid a voice]

grissom9922:

the way that he foregrounds particular sounds at particular times is sort of reminiscent of a jazz combo trading off solos to me

which is not something that typically comes to mind when I’m listening to music like this

I agree that it does feel like unique “lexicon;” it’s not an easy record to describe aloud

mike d:

that telas employs so much organic instrumentation probably contributes to its jazz vibes, particularly the woodwinds and strings, but also how the sound design creates the feeling of a physical space specific to the record

grissom9922:

among my notes for this conversation is the phrase “world-building,” which kept coming to mind – the experience is sort akin to a new landscape being constructed around you

mike d:

i found that approach pretty beguiling, and it’s a characteristic that links other recent favorites of mine in the electronic scene, like autechre’s nts sessions 1-4 or iglooghost’s neo wax bloom

especially lately, it’s nice to go somewhere else

grissom9922:

you know I hadn’t thought to connect this record to the recent autechre behemoths, but that does make sense – those records are also doing something very alien

(on that note, this particular stretch of track two very much sounds like outer-space to me; it’s like, arthouse space mountain queue music)

mike d:

very much so, and it’s achieved with a lot of organic instrumentation! these keys and vibraphones syncing up with synth streams and transporting you somewhere in between

returning to the meta-narrative for a sec, another thing i’ve really enjoyed on this record is its sonic gamesmanship. there are multiple moments where it feels like elements of another electronic artist’s sonic footprint has been repurposed into the landscape of telas: spoken-word moments that resemble arca’s recent output, plucked strings similar to tim hecker’s work with the konoyo ensemble, a gauzy synth passage reminiscent of oneohtrix point never, etc.

obviously it’s all in service of the album, but that also came across as a flex to me

grissom9922:

that’s another now-that-you-mention-it element of this for me; you’re a bit more tuned into the experimental electronic world than I am, but I do hear it

in the vocals particularly, which are a minor but really distinctive element of this record

there’s almost an ASMR quality to them that does feel arca-esque

mike d:

it’s especially interesting since he was famously pretty shy/reticent with vocals prior to sirens in 2016

and whereas that record featured actual sung “tunes,” the vocals on this album (/cenizas) are just as textural as all the instrumentation

grissom9922:

for sure, they’re treated very unconventionally

interesting to note that sirens, compared to either of the records released under his own name since, does feel a lot more familiar/conventional in its melodies/song structures

I do wonder if people were expecting more of that from him

mike d:

it seems like whether or not they were, the reaction to him ending up there has been more muted. though again, i have less clue than ever how people experience music these days

grissom9922:

part of me even wonders if the reception to sirens pushed him in a less conventional direction; I can’t exactly picture him presenting music like this during the 6pm red stage slot at pitchfork fest, y’know?

mike d:

without engaging in too much psychological projection onto a person i’ll never know, i find that plausible. his two post-sirens albums were the compilations released under his against all logic alias, and neither cenizas nor telas seem to be courting an electronic-curious crossover audience

grissom9922:

the nature of the AAL releases is interesting in that context too I think, in that they’re more accessible than telas/cenizas but released almost intentionally under-the-radar

mike d:

it endears me to jaar. he’s clearly a fan of club/house music, enough to put two different versions of his stamp on the sub-genre, but doesn’t let that interest define his whole “deal”

with that in mind, he comes across as an artist whose musical self-definition has continually evolved in the decade or so that he’s been a known musician, and is perhaps still evolving

no two nicolas jaar records sound the same, and telas is his hardest to pin down yet

grissom9922:

yeah I would agree, he’s covered a ton of sonic ground in that time

and continues to expand the horizon

on the note of pinning this record down, I glanced at the rateyourmusic page on it today and found the range of genre tags kind of amusing- “glitch ambient electroacoustic microsound” is where they landed

which…kind of gets there

mike d:

it’s a more-or-less accurate list that also speaks to the elusive architecture of telas. i wouldn’t call it ambient per say, but its moments of soothing calm evoke ambient music

the last song “tellelas” (my favorite on the record) definitely earns the glitch tag. all the clicks that sound like bugs crawling around inside a keyboard remind me of a glitch artist like ryoji ikeda

grissom9922:

there’s a real push-and-pull at work with the ambient elements of it and the more assertive ones – the percussion, the glitch-y-ness of this track

I think “telecima” is the standout for me, it’s the most transportative passage of the record

I do love the sort of mournful drones that pop up on this final track though, it feels like a proper closer

mike d:

that push-and-pull aspect to the music is another quality of telas that i enjoy.  there’s a sense that each song is moving towards something, even if the end point and the way we get there aren’t super legible

i think the proper groove “tellelas” sinks into in its back-half really gets at the idea of this record being a “reconstruction,” and something having been reconstructed across its runtime

grissom9922:

for sure – it really drives home the narrative element of the whole piece

which, again, is not something that typically comes to mind for me in the context of experimental electronic listening

mike d:

speaks to that cinematic quality you attributed to this album earlier

i mean, his three 2020 records practically adhere to a three-act structure: the fall, the rock-bottom, the rise…

grissom9922:

really makes me think I ought to listen to all three consecutively that way, ideally whilst lying down in a planetarium or something

mike d:

it makes me wonder what’s next for him. between those three releases (and with telas especially) jaar seems to be operating increasingly free of expectations

grissom9922:

yeah this record particularly feels like a tough act to follow

I sort of suspect we won’t hear from him for a bit after such a prolific streak?

mike d:

plausible and deserved after releasing so much material in quick succession

all right, ben – any final thoughts on this record?

grissom9922:

I think my biggest takeaway here is that the more I talk about this one, the more time I want to spend with it

I still feel like I’ve only scratched the surface

mike d:

i feel similarly. it’s like an obelisk or some other artifact to be studied

i hope it’s not ignored during whatever version of year-end list-making happens in four months

at any rate, getting to talk about it with you was a treat. we’ll have to do this again soon

grissom9922:

agreed, glad we had this opportunity to dig into it together