Tile A Lung No. E

Tile's first e.p 'a lung no. e' is a limited edition CD-R release put together by the arts collective Utrophia (www.utrophia.net). Combining jazz, folk, urban, electro-acoustic and kraut-rock the e.p is a journey through many varied influences always maintaining a sound that is unique to Tile. Fusing many textured layers of sounds and melodies some tunes are purely instrumental and others have poetic lyrical observations sung in a soft, very non-American (Tile hails from South East London) sounding accent.

'The songs are testament to the moment in which they are recorded. Tile explains when asked about the ethos behind the set of recordings. The underlying philosophy to the e.p is that the tunes will never be reproduced in a live context whereby the same emotions and sentiments would also have to be reproduced. 'There are many underlying circumstances to the formation of these tunes and it seems unnatural to try to recreate them, completely out of context in fact, I prefer to have these recordings tightly controlled as being a pure snapshot of the time in which they were created. That's why most of the guitar parts will have been devised on tunings that are deliberately undocumented and any sounds used in any one song won't be kept for longer than one month (the average duration of the production of a song). They are lost songs, ghosts captured not unlike recordings from a hundred years ago, really belonging to a realm close to death.'Despite the weighty theory behind these recordings the tunes are incredibly accessible. In 'Saulatrium' the introduction of 'heart do things peo' gives way to a glorious electro pop reverie in which two vocal parts combine to create the sentence 'heart-beats do strange things to people', creating a sense of completion and satisfaction whilst still posing an element of disjointed unease of play between the two voices. The song goes onto describe the very human characteristics involving the heart-beat (i.e. blushing, anger, being alive). Washes of overlaying sound make the tune sporadic and partially without a centre, fluctuating like atoms and gas, a characteristic dominant in the tune 'Haretole' which is purely instrumental building up in layers with measured control.

Using electronic and live drums, percussive instruments including the clapping of teeth and beat boxing, with soft synths over live acoustic and electric guitar parts, Tile builds songs masterfully and with fortuitous imagination leaving much open to the process of recording. Snapping between time signatures and 'organic' to 'processed' sound sources the collection of recordings are exciting and vital and invigorating to absorb and appreciate their realm of escape.