The smart and poignant world that Los Angeles synth pop outfit Ardency inhabit is one that is firmly rooted in the realities that exist across the spectrum of human emotion. A world of actualities and a realisation and learned acceptance that often there is no resolution to the problems life serves up and the consequences that result. It’s not an easy thing to explain to most, but life exists in all its positive and negative facets and a knowing acceptance of this and being able to own where you stand and have stood within it can be the ultimate in freedom. For Christian Gomez and Daniel Noguera there is a cathartic release that comes from understanding that vulnerabilities are as inevitable as they are natural and that being unable to control or indeed resolve events that culminate in feelings of sadness and loss is normal.
The deeply affecting musical experience that the duo offer up on their new EP The Ones That Miss Me, is representative of both the aural navigator and creative outlet that assists them in unpacking and processing these emotions. Each element is restrained or enhanced in line with its emotional utility to the song. Gomez’s uniquely arresting voice is starkly laid bare across the five tracks while his ever so subtle guitar motifs present the perfect accompaniment to Noguera’s combination of atmospheric effects and his deep range of synth applications. They are then juxtaposed against bright and delicately shifting keys and the oppositional gap between the two creates a strange dischordance sonically representing the lack of clarity lyrically and the absence of closure.
As life long musicians, Ardency are well aware of the power of a simple unexpected timing change or an elongated chord employed for effect. It’s often all it takes to the change the direction of a track. When music represents a set of feelings and an artist knows inwardly why they make it and what that means, those subtle changes in application can often be seismic shifts in form.
The Ones That Miss Me is out on Majestic Casual Records here. Listen to the title track below.
NOTE: This has been rewritten after being published prematurely and incomplete.
The Ones That Miss Me
Ardency (USA)
From the EP, ‘The Ones That Miss Me’, Majestic Casual.
Ardency Facebook
Audio Stream