Systemsolo is the new moniker of PD Radford-Hancock (43, Philosopher, Artist, Professional Schizophrenic), formerly better known as the creative force behind downtempo artist Padaraha. The Padaraha project was a chronicle of improvement and experimentation. His 2019 album, released in November, opens and closes with different takes on a track that clearly envisages and predicts the imposition of social distancing in 2020.
But PD grew up in the jungle, cutting swathes through amen breaks and dark shadows. Somehow, the dungeon crawling grind of his downtempo projects failed to scratch the itch of the formative experiences of his musical youth. Having levelled up somewhat, it was time to face the boss level. Hence the new persona and the effort to break out of the genre confines of tempo and mood. His Initial EP, Patterns of Interference makes it clear that there is a desire to return to the cinematic pressure of jungle life.
And now he is clearing a space for the funky religion-starting UFO to land in the middle of that jungle, bringing a multidimensional drumkit and galactic basslines. The album Data/Is/Reward spans the creation and continuation, the waking and waning of history itself, and vacillates wildly between the private and personal reel of the individual consciousness and the wild expanses of untamed infinity. Somehow the music acts as a shamanic hallucinogen, at once evocative and mysterious, at times rough and unpolished, but giving way to crystalline geometries that satisfy some deep primal yearning.
The album has an unapologetically raw essence, like something ripped from the rehearsal tapes, because PD tends to write and create musical patterns and then perform them live, adding minimal edits to the psychedelic journey of the extempore pressure that created it. In this sense, it is very much a live album, punctuated by the intertrack spaces of meditative lockdown life.
Lifted from the new album is the track “Haunted Zamboni”, an experimental track with pure rhythm at its core. The piece demonstrates the artist’s panache for shifting and stuttered beats, paired with a peppering of otherworldly synth instrumentation to create an epic exploration of Systemsolo’s sonic world.
Listen to Haunted Zamboni below
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