Photo: Simone Trabucchi

Marina Herlop will release her third album on Bill Kouligas’ PAN in May.

Though Herlop is described as a Catalan pianist, she’s moving into experimental composition and production. Pripyat, her first full album produced on a computer, following 2016’s Nanook and 2018’s Babasha, is described as her most “intensely emotional” work to date by the Berlin label.

Listening to Pripyat, we’re told you can feel the “emotional toil and creative endeavour” that went into the record.

Fans of Nanook and Babasha will recognise the combination of melancholic piano, but the album has a fuller, almost chaotic sound when compared to Herlop’s previous work, with the addition of electronic drums, electric bass lines, and other production effects. The release is the “perfect combination of computer production trickery and intimate emotional release.”

Ahead of the album’s release, Herlop has shared “miu,” on which she employs the intricate trickery of her voice, tracing rhythmical clusters around the subtlest of musical beds, in a technique inspired by Carnatic music of southern India. It was among the first songs that she ever made on a computer.

Tracklisting

01. abans abans
02. shaolin mantis
03. lyssof
04. miu
05. ubuntu
06. Kaddisch
07. miu (Choir Version)

Pripyat LP is scheduled for May 20 release. Meanwhile, you can stream “miu” in full below and pre-order here.