Few current producers are connecting abstract content and politics with dance music like Selaw Abd aka Bergsonist. Far away from superficial lo-fi aesthetics or white label chic, Abd always seems to aim for context in her direct and unpolished productions. While theory and politics may inform her track titles, her production is very much lead by intuition^[1]. Her new EP for Where To Now? makes it clear, that those two traits are indeed connected. On Solyaris, Bergsonist shares her take and perspective of dealing with the anxiety to succeed at school as a migrant in the USA—and how she channelled said anxiety into music.

“Fidel Gastro”, the ironically titled last track of the EP, moves straight to the body itself and unpleasant experiences with a indigestion. This also becomes apparent in the video: Abd created 3D graphics^[2] of various bowels. Those graphics were processed in real-time by Greg Zifcak, using old and obsolete broadcasting gear. The result lets one move further and further into an abstract body as the track’s filtered piano-chords get sucked up into a delay effect—all while the beat becomes more and more physical…

The Solyaris EP from Bergsonist on Where To Now? is available now.

PS: Abd also runs Bizaarbazaar (https://bizaarbazaar.com/), a platform for interviews, premieres, mixes and more—or a “research studio focusing on unique resonant aesthetics” as she calls it. In an accompanying publication for the platform’s first compilation, BIZAARBAZAAR #01 , an interview with Ekman originally featured in zweikommasieben #14 was re-published.

[1] “I’m always trying to use ‘intuition’ as the leading force in my creative process and trying to detach myself from preconceived thoughts that I have about the machine I’m using” she states in an interview with Inverted Audio. Or over at Atlas Electronic: “The whole ideology brews the way I deal with my reality. I feel using intuition as main fuel can be more exciting and fruitful than using ‘intelligence’. You see, instinct proceeds things organically whereas intelligence treats things mechanically.»

[2] See also Abd’s “new visual Deleuzian” project 3dbergsonist.