Ephemeral, drifting, and warm: a long drive in an old car, across landscapes both lush and vast, traveling not to reach a destination, but to wander and observe and accumulate. The radio crackles and drifts across stations, creating a tapestry of sounds befitting the warm sunlight and feeling of forward motion. This is the experience of Documa’s Lo-Fi One Two Seven. A collection of two EPs—At Home With and The Color of Documa—Lo-Fi One Two Seven is a journey across an expansive analog countryside. Warm, warbling, fingerpicked guitars are omnipresent across the tracklisting, always backed with basslines that propel the listener forward through the weaving landscape. Just as one may stop and pick up snippets of conversation and daily life along a back-road ramble, so too does the listener along the path forged by Documa, dusted as the tracks are by arabesque layers of soundclips and instruments. Lo-Fi One Two Seven is alive and flowing with life: a terrarium of sounds preserved and thriving. Masterfully interwoven, this sonic mosaic is both nostalgic and refreshing.
By Anthony Lickwar