Zone Black

Emil Amos, the songwriter and multi-instrumentalist best known for his long-running avant-folk project Holy Sons and membership in groups including Grails and OM, was commissioned to write material for the iconic KPM music library, to be used in film and television. Unfortunately, the executive in charge of experimental music left KPM, so Amos ended up reworking the music he was composing for the library into his second solo release, Zone Black. During the 2010s, Amos and Grails bandmate Alex John Hall released several albums as Lilacs & Champagne, combining J Dilla-inspired sampling with live instrumentation, resulting in a haunted form of downtempo instrumental hip-hop. Amos then issued a cinematic solo album, titled Filmmusik after Can co-founder Irmin Schmidts series of the same name, in 2017. Zone Black continues in the direction of these releases, mixing the bad-trip vibes of illbient with the noir atmospheres of crime films and late-night television. Featuring guest contributions by A.E. Paterra and Steve Moore of Zombi, the album sometimes resembles Mo Wax-era DJ Shadow scoring a gritty thriller. "Moving Target" pastes samples of sinister laughter into a spooky groove that feels like sneaking down a dark corridor, trying to avoid being seen. "Theme from a Personal Prison" lives up to its title, expressing extreme isolation through sorrowful guitar melodies and vocals that sound like cries for help. "Bad Night at Cowboys" begins with a fog of ghostly vocal harmonies recalling a more innocent time in the past, then develops more involved, choppy beat programming. "Red Palms" has drums reminiscent of Cans Jaki Liebezeit, but shrouded in dark shadows. The steamy saxophones and lush strings of "Realistic #1" melt into the ambient gauze of "Blue Palms." Whether or not anyone ends up using material from Zone Black as the soundtrack to a hard-boiled psychological drama, the music creates a fantastically chilling atmosphere on its own. ~ Paul Simpson