Album Review: Purdy - Body Variations

29 June 2014 | 10:53 am | Amorina Fitzgerald Hood

This is a beautiful work.

Presented as a single suite, Body Variations is a cinematic journey in sound by Sydney producer and composer Purdy. Moody, soft and haunting, but with a dash of wry humour, the composition is a series of short movements that evolve texturally. It spans across abstract instrumental interjections and melodic explorations, alienating soundscapes, wavering high frequencies, sparse percussion and sampled dialogue in the first half. The second half opens with humour, a lopsided country tune, complete with animals in the periphery, which leads into a beat-driven, piano-led suspension of time. Intriguing, amusing and eerie, this is a beautiful work.