CVLTS aren't what they seem to be. Just like the name, the project is an illusion, creating and blurring the lines of what's actually there. The name is rather fitting because the project sounds rather cult-like (but what's up with that V!!???). Shadowy and mysterious CVLTS, based out of Kansas City, seems to be the familiar 21st century drone outfit: long, brooding, synthetic and dare I say hypnogogic (lol). Yet, underneath that shell, is a firm and creative understanding of its influences. At times delving into psych, and expansive missives of komische, the project expands and compresses like thick smog.
Their new album Realiser, out on Aguirre Records, is a realization of their form. Beginning with “Brahma Weapons”, with its fogged and faded vocals and drums, to the vast infinity of “Velvet Dreams”, the outfit continually wander, but remain intact with their singular blanket of noise. Album highlight “TIme Debt II” pours their signiture melancholia into a marbled air, while “Wamego Fluff” has a surging synth and bass, pounding softly into one's mind. What sets CVLTS apart isn't how they make their music, but how they approach it: with an assured sense of individualism and able understanding of the haunted and disturbed past. CVLTS' Realiser proves that the listener can't expect what happens next because in their wild haze, there is something completely unforeseen. CVLTS, therefore, remain shrouded in smokey mystique like monks bowing to perform a scraded and secret ritual.
You can listen to Realiser in its entirity and watch the tripped out video for Brahma Weapons below…
