EMMIT FENN - OVERFLOW

Berkeley producer/singer/songwriter's Emmit Fenn’s single "Overflow" is ebullient yet reserved, gushing with emotion yet static and steady. Read our review to find out more!

In the tarot deck, the 3 of cups is called 'Abundance.' The image is of three stacked cups, being watered by gushing water lilies. These cups runneth over, over-full to bursting. And yet, for all the rushing, the image, and associated feeling, is tranquil, still, peaceful. The symbolism suggests someone being so nourished by their surroundings, so full of love that it just erupts out of them. They are beatific, in their abundance, like walking Buddhas, bodhisattvas of compassion.

Emmit Fenn's earliest work has been compared to a coming-of-age film, with soaring, emotive electronics and ambient vocals approximating the adrenaline amphetamine rush of adolescence, young love, and discovering the world for the first time. As the years have ticked on, however, Fenn's music has become more introverted, inward looking and searching. Where his rhythms and melodies once recreated the feeling of crossing unknown horizons, this new state finds Fenn more self-contained, composed and meditative.

To put it simply, "Overflow" is music for dance floor meditation, for locking into the groove and staying there, optimally until the sun rises. All manner of epiphany occur in this state, this locked groove. It's the electronic equivalent of the silent wisdom of the 3 Of Cups, quietly explosive, subtle but powerful enough to move mountains.

EMMIT FENN - OVERFLOW

Musically, "Overflow"'s piano melodies bring to mind the silvered ripple of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata." It has a similar timeless, contemplative feeling. That doesn't mean that nothing's happening, however. The silvered flickering piano is like watching the moonlight reflected on dark waves. It brings to mind the saying "still waters run deep." Often, the quiet ones have the most to say.

Emmit Fenn's going to have his say to a wide audience, if he continues at this rate. We Are: The Guard predict he'll be as big as James Blake, in a just world. 

J. Simpson occupies the intersection between criticism, creativity, and academia. Based out of Portland, Or., he is the author of Forestpunk, an online journal/brand studying the traces of horror, supernatural, and the occult through music, fashion and culture. He plays in the dreamfolk band Meta-Pinnacle with his partner Lily H. Valentine, with whom he also co-founded Bitstar Productions, a visual arts collective focused on elevating Pop Culture to High Art.