‘Theme for Narcoleptics’: Inside the Somnolent World of ‘SKANTAGIO’ and SQUANDERERS
The trio of Wendy Eisenberg, David Grubbs, and Kramer operates through instinct and intuition, carving delicate fissures in the fabric of sound.
Their newest album, ‘SKANTAGIO,’ emerges not from composition, but from deep listening and mutual estrangement from convention. Each piece feels discovered, unfolding in a space where melody is neither centered nor discarded, but gently destabilized.
Following their acclaimed debut ‘If a Body Meet a Body,’ the group continues its pursuit of tonal ambiguity and rhythmic unmooring. The new single, ‘THEME FOR NARCOLEPTICS,’ distills this ethos into a suspended lull of bowed strings and disquieting calm. There is a careful reluctance in every gesture, a restraint that allows silence to speak. Kramer’s accompanying video, constructed in his Ambient-Cinema idiom, renders sleep paralysis as an aesthetic, using archival footage to blur perception.
What SQUANDERERS offer is neither narrative nor spectacle. Instead, they create conditions for sound to breathe in its own strange dialect. Their music is slow to unfold and slower to vanish. It invites the listener not to grasp, but to drift. ‘SKANTAGIO’ does not declare its purpose. It exists like a found object: obscure, resonant, and quietly spellbinding.
Headline photo: Kramer with SQUANDERERS (Wendy Eisenberg & David Grubbs). Photo by Zarstar.
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