Berlin based DIY eclectic musician, producer, visual artist, book author and Blackjack Illuminist Records DIY label founder Alexander Leonard Donat is always on fire : a plethora of solo projects (Dreampunk Fir Cone Children, Indie Shoegazer Leonard Las Vegas, Arabian Krautrocker Feverdreamt, Dark Ambient Neoclassicist Leonard Donat and Fuzz Ambient Droner Infravoids), member of the Electro-Clash Hardcore band Jet Pilot and Ambient Postrockers Flight Recorder.
Still fresh from the brilliant debut album “Bias” as half of indie / electronic duo Whole along fellow Berliner Thomas Schernikau, here is a new double EP, titled “XI/XII”, under his main moniker VLIMMER out today, CD/Limited edition hand painted wooden box set CD and Digital, on his own Blackjack Illuminist Records.
As is evidenced by the tracklist is a work split in two halves : the more airy “XI” comes up with titles like “Wärme” (warmth), “Leben” (life), “Lösung” (solution) and “Licht” (light), which stands in contrast with the more aggressive “XII” with “Farblosigkeit” (colorlessness), “Krakenkombat” (octopus combat), “Zerschmetterung” (wrecking) or “Atemnot” (breathlessness).
Vlimmer is in the midst of his 18-chapter narrative and, on “XI” loses his lost, impotent protagonist to a dream world which could hardly appear more relaxed.
At time murky and euphoric, consistently intense, immersive and captivating, blending elements of shoegaze, dream pop, dark post-punk over dense electronic foundations, “Leben” is lead by solid pounding rhythmic beats, punctuated by percussive outbursts, that define hypnotic, gloomy atmospheric patterns sprinkled with splashes of searing reverb-infused guitar and restless enveloping wistful synth piecing together a sense of impending doom and chaos, permeated by distant, muted, and subdued vocals of fear, anxiety, and apprehension, struggling with fragments of a disjointed world.
