Volume 3: Signals and Decay
Dream Skills is the solo guise of Donald Grant McLean. Although more well known in the independent music scene as the founder of iconoclastic noise rock unit Action Beat, whose grueling, decades long touring schedule in both Europe and the United States are campaigns worthy of the annals of DIY Punk, in the last several years, McLean’s primary focus has shifted to electronic music in a similarly iconoclastic fashion. The emergence of Action Beat splinter group OMA, helmed by former The Ex vocalist G.W. Sok, give a good indication of the kind of sonic territory McLean’s solo project inhabits, having made records whilst in residency at WORM, Rotterdam and at the world-renowned Devon Analogue Studio.
His third album under this moniker, ‘Signals & Decay’ is formed more akin to a suite of music than a traditional album, with several technical and stylistic themes reappearing throughout, creating a thread between the recordings 7 individual pieces. Opener ‘Islands’ begins with mellow, chiming electric piano chords, whose looped tantric quality almost masks the subtle unease in the millisecond too long gaps of silence between each melodic strike. Over the course of the songs 10 minutes, McLean patiently unveils the architecture of the track, slowly blushing the hypnotic keys with undulating sine waves, a tension still existing that undermines any hope of the songs gestures towards complete serenity. It’s a tension that flows into the proceeding piece ‘Carbon’. Containing all the signifiers of traditional ambient music piece, including found sounds of crows cawing in Tokyo’s Yoyogi Park and a gorgeous hauntological loop, McLean continuously disrupts the calming atmosphere with scattered hi-hats and turntable static that keeps the ears continuously awake throughout. McLean does finally offer some beatific respite on ‘Aeronautics’, a dramatic paen to dub techno, bristling with fizzling, dawn rise imagery. On ‘Transmitter’, colder atmospheres are at work, sine tones and glitched beats narrated by heavily accented female voice, stating over and over again “just listen to me”, invoking images of Soviet Re-education centres.
‘Sexual Imagery’ returns to the late afternoon electric piano of the album opener, sounding fuller and warmer surrounded by crystalline synthesizer chords. Again, McLean knowingly disrupts the beauty of this piece, inserting a radio broadcast about the Vietnam War just long enough for you to be conscious of him making some sort of political point, before wiping away the content in a switch to another station and an awful, overblown add jingle.
What makes ‘Signals & Decay’ such an exciting listen is its revisionist approach to the iconography of electronic music. Containing details from early 90’s warp, the ambient room music of the 80’s and the modular synth experiments of the 70’s, McLean’s goal isn’t to just conjure specifics moods, but revise them to his own artistic coordinates and reimagine what each could sound like formed in his own hands. It makes for a restless yet invigorating listen.
David McLean - Tombed Visions Records, March 2020
