Traveling through space certainly does sound like a lonely endeavor, or at least that’s what Toronto-based ANAMAI is trying to convey on the first single from their debut LP, Sallows. The duo, featuring David Psutka of Egyptrixx and Anna Mayberry of HSY, create a celestial sound that is both heavenly and dense. Weighty, almost discernibly low tones and hauntingly spacious dubbed vocal harmonies play off each other, like bubbles being blown, converging and separating and never bursting. “Lucia” is the audio equivalent of a complete disconnect from human contact—a percussionless, soothingly sluggish, pained lullaby that floats and slow-motion somersaults along a foamy sea of tranquility created with spaced-out throbs of bass undertones and effected twangs of shifting pitch. Beautifully hushed lyrics chanting “Oh, you let me down sometimes,” and “Can’t you love me some other way?” create the paradoxical setting of feeling so close to the music, but so distant from everything else.
Sallows is out March 10 on Buzz Records, you can stream “Lucia” below.
