Sandy Winiferová - Knitwear

 

Released: July 28   

Marking her first release on Molt Fluid, Sandy Winiferová brings us an understated and peculiar album. Knitwear is a work that is difficult to place and feels a bit like something in passing. First, there’s a variety of sonic fragments that litter virtually every track. The first two, “Forgetful Places” and “Leaving Early,” are minute little pieces that feature soft piano keys and pieces of environmental and found sounds, all of which kind of laze about the soundscape in a calm and reflective manner. But then things switch up with “Afterthought.” That once calm and soft landscape of found sounds is suddenly replaced with crunchy feedback and dark clouds of static. And with this track, the guitar-centric noises begin to come by more often, notably with the very next track “Commuter” which takes away the wall of feedback and replaces it with heavily delayed but otherwise clean tones meandering through a reflections pool of sound. 

The album as a whole is rather diverse in its approaches, but remarkably consistent in tone. Even as we come to the more minimalistic tracks such as “Your Room,” which feels almost barely perceptible at times, that sense of peaceful emptiness comes through beautifully. It’s not a particularly depressing album, but there is a sense of longing and even loss there, though never clarity on its reasons. The final two tracks quite solidify these feelings with “Lullabye” utilizing scratchy guitar sounds in a cavernous space. It sets up that emptiness motif wonderfully while the final track, “No Flowers” builds on it and takes that sense of peacefulness into the ending as soft strums of a washed out guitar fade away slowly into the ether. An enchanting and slightly haunting experience altogether.