10 September 2021
Who: VARIÁT is a new project from sound artist Dmytro Fedorenko. Now based in Berlin, Fedorenko is one of Ukraine’s most prolific pioneers of electronic music, working under aliases including Kotra and Cluster Lizard (together with the artist Kateryna Zavoloka). Fedorenko also works with video, photography, and painting, forging a complete, immersive landscape from the depths of his multi-disciplinary creativity. VARIÁT continues that tradition, allowing listeners to dive deep into what the artist describes as “dissonant noise poetry”.
What to expect: VARIÁT blends ambient and metal with influences from psychedelic music and folk songs. One track in particular, “I Can See Everything From Here”, is a deep soundscape which fluctuates between being meditative, mysterious, and intense, although the record is better digested as a whole rather than in separate songs. In the wider wall of sound, genres melt away, making this a record which will awaken something different in everyone — and a journey worth embarking on.
What they say: “Conceived in 2020 as a provocative creative outlet, VARIÁT is founded on ideas of transgression, reinvention, and liberation, the consequence of observing prescribed artistic boundaries and pursuing new depths of aesthetic freedom,” says Fedorenko’s label, Prostir. “The project began as an exploration of new recording techniques: metallic materials used as percussion and channelled through blown amps, toms played with a hammer, drilled cymbals, raw, dimensional textures produced from found objects.”
Why you need to listen: Fedorenko’s project is not for the faint-hearted, but it is an experience guaranteed to broaden your musical horizons. By questioning genre boundaries, the project invites listeners to push beyond the novelty and immediacy which drive the contemporary music industry, and spend their time instead getting lost inside a cacophony that is constantly asking new questions.
