Jenny Hval: "Kingsize (Kelly Lee Owens Rework)"

“Music is a way of making the body,” Jenny Hval said this year. So one would have to imagine the Norwegian avant-gardist would appreciate the rhythmic throb of this minimal techno rework by London’s Kelly Lee Owens—how it is not unlike a pulsating heart sending streams of blood through this previously spoken-word track. “Kingsize” was the sci-fi prologue to Hval’s poetic Apocalypse, girl and now it truly bangs. These new visceral, clicking textures move us physically and intuitively, presumably in a dark club, upping the song’s accessibility without losing any of its sophistication. The charred atmosphere only makes it more hypnotic.

Hval’s vision can seem challenging on the surface, but Apocalypse is her most inviting record in a string of great ones. She’s found a kindred spirit in Owens, who herself makes ambient pop with a kind of dream logic at play. (Her recent song “Arthur” was an ode to Arthur Russell.) Owens’ remix has a certain elegance and composure; there’s a crucial simplicity to how she deftly evolves “Kingsize”. Unsurprisingly, Owens also had a hand in 2013′s excellent Drone Logic from Daniel Avery, an artist who is as impressively out-of-time as Hval. (She sang over its Detroit acid sounds and co-wrote its closer, “Know We’ll Be Here”.) A singer as well as a producer, Owens seems to really hear Hval on “Kingsize”. Just as this ecstatic rework bursts open three minutes in, Hval deadpans, “What is soft dick rock?” And in that moment you can picture Hval’s work having so many lives.

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