Arca - "Sheep"


Sheep begins with a looped dial tone coming from another parallel dimension. A barnyard cacophony of well, sheep, urban grunts and uhhs, then kicks into (fascinating) short circuiting overdrive—horns, a train? A woman moaning, throbbing and we're back where the S&M runway of Xen left off. A bathhouse, club thumps, dark elevators, a dial tone that can’t be reached. An Eastern flute calls inwards, a digital ping, a digital pong—walls transforming, we're back on the elevator. A woman sings in a language nearly obliterated by conquest, this mélange hints at Chancha Via Circuito, if Chancha were purging his electronic demons on ayahuasca. Maddening anxiety, phosphorescent, the clacking percussion of what sounds like an automatic handgun, the trumpet of a beast signals this transition, sloshing elephants thru an oasis amidst arid lands and a contaminated sunset in what could be Tokyo or Mexico City (really any giant metropolis where you’re bobbing your head right now) dodging traffic, checking your social network for your next high. That trumpet again—mad. The traces of Arca's haunted piano, obliterated into the nebula of his signature sound continuum. For the grand finale, we pray. A chorus of haunting tragedy unfolds, and post modern cathedrals collapse in the darkness of the second decade of our young century.