Loscil absorbs some seaside vibes

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      Whether for his soul or for his songbook, strolling along beaches has apparently done wonders for Scott Morgan, the artist known in electronic and ambient circles as Loscil. The prolific soundscapist’s 2012 effort Sketches From New Brighton was a glitch-and-drone cycle inspired by the sights of the titular East Van park, from container ships to the nearby Second Narrows bridge. Morgan sought similar inspiration for his latest effort, Sea Island, by heading out to Richmond. There, he’d toss his headphones on, breathe in some sea air, and ponder the direction of his then in-progress pieces.

      “I’d take them on my phone and walk on the jetty, just kind of listening,” he tells the Straight of traversing spots like Iona Beach to do his musical musing. “It’s a great way to get out of the studio, kind of hear the music outside of the same room that I’d been listening to it over and over in. It changes the context a little, it gives you a different perspective on it.”

      Having just dropped off his daughters at dance classes, Morgan is spending a brisk but sunny Saturday morning at Main Street’s Continental Coffee to talk about the two-year process it took to make Sea Island, his seventh full-length effort for the venerable Kranky label. Between sips from a takeout coffee cup, he explains that even since his European tour last spring, his latest collection of electroacoustic compositions has undergone massive instrumentation changes.

      “I was using a tabletop slide guitar and feeding that into my computer and processing it live, grabbing loops of that,” he explains of how the tracks had been performed alongside collaborator Jason Zumpano overseas. “I kind of gave up on that for the record and sort of rebuilt the sounds. I ditched the guitar and used different sources; I just got sick of the sound of a guitar.”

      Once Loscil returned, he reconfigured arrangements to rely on the relaxed sounds of a Rhodes electric piano, supplied by Zumpano, and the mellow, malleted tones of a marimba played by another past collaborator, Josh Lindstrom.

      “Pieces, they’re kind of like living organisms to me: they grow and they transform and eventually die, because I just get sick of them,” Morgan theorizes. “Some of them go through many different iterations, especially the ones with melodic parts, because I can get other people to play. Instead of strings you get piano. Or maybe there’s no live parts so I have to challenge myself to figure out how to fill in the gaps electronically.”

      The opener, “Ahull”, finds Morgan’s cresting waves of manipulated sonics washing from one speaker to another, on top of Lindstrom’s harmonious percussion. Elsewhere, “Catalina 1943”, which references the construction of floatplanes at the old Boeing Canada plant, adds the subtle violin work of Fieldhead member Elaine Reynolds to a gentle accelerando arrangement. The highlight, “Sea Island Murders”, is an epic, eight-minute piece that finds a mournful wash of droning synths enveloping and snuffing out faint traces of white-light gospel organs.

      A quick Google search of “Sea Island Murders” brings up Loscil’s new tune right away. The next result, however, is an old clipping from a Sea Island, Georgia, newspaper from 1983 that describes a double homicide in which a retired couple were found dead in their home, wrapped in cloth and tape from head to toe. They died of “slow suffocation”. While seemingly on-point thematically, the slaying of the pair is just a coincidence, and not tied to Loscil’s latest project. Morgan hadn’t even heard of the U.S. story, but admits that his time spent at Sea Island’s Burkeville neighbourhood and Iona Beach left him contemplating a killer story of his own.

      “I had this image in my head, this kind of magic-realism crime story where there were these murders,” he explains of his as-yet-unwritten piece of regionally minded fiction. “The detectives were called to the scene and they have to solve the crime before the island is flooded, because it’s at sea level. I was thinking of this rising sea level: eventually, all the evidence is going to be covered up with water.”

      The months to come will find Morgan touring in support of Sea Island, while his spare time, he explains, will be spent on forthcoming projects with former Rachel’s member Rachel Grimes and with Destroyer, and an upcoming solo album to be presented as an iOS app. Penning a gritty murder novel at this point seems to be low on his to-do list. But, when pressed about whether he’ll get back to the tale before inspiration is submerged like a Sea Island crime scene, the ambitious musician notes with a smile, “I’ll write it someday.”

      Loscil headlines the last night of the Big Joy Festival on Saturday (December 6) at the Remington Gallery.

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