Daily Dose is your daily source for the song you absolutely, positively need to hear every day. Curated by the Paste Music Team.
Jerkcurb is midair. There’s something so lightweight and feathery about everything the Southeast London musician and multidisciplinary artist has pieced together since releasing his first work under his current moniker in 2012—from the somber atmospheres on earlier tracks like “Midnight Snack” or the jumpier, bizarro moods of his latest studio cuts, “Voodoo Saloon” and “Timelapse Tulip.”
Jacob Read has released a new Jerkcurb offering this Tuesday afternoon, this one going down the gauzier, dreamier rabbit hole. The new track, titled “Air Con Eden,” is the latest cut and title track taken from the musician’s forthcoming (and long-awaited) debut album Air Con Eden.
Read creates a lush, imaginative playing field on “Air Con Eden,” where the track comes alive in the dayglow of ringing synths, reverberating guitars and rich, sedated melodies. Read sings of the malleability and worthlessness of time against chimes and other fractured remnants of shopping-mall Muzak: “I’ll be in my air-conditioned Eden / Where the seasons never change / They won’t go away.”
The track’s production—from its keening guitars to the bass hidden somewhere underneath the crashing cymbals—is pristine and almost squeaky-clean, each sound, tone and mood working to capture the feeling of stalled time in a four-minute lullaby.
The term “air-conditioned eden” recalls the early Victor Gruen shopping malls built in America in the mid-20th century, Jerkcurb explains in a statement. Elaborating on the themes of the album, the musician continues:
The first malls were nature conservations, literal edens with exotic plants and rare birds. The gift shops, were of equal or less importance to the nature. The logical evolution of consumerism, was the carpark, which resulted in the shift into becoming the shopping malls we know today. But the concept of the climate controlled environment is still relevant, and it really interests me, the idea that technology is at war with the natural world, this constant balance. An old concept that is eternally relevant. At the time I was working in retail and I wrote this song for myself to justify my existence being there.
Air Con Eden is out Sept. 13 via Handsome Dad Records, and will feature collaborations from Kendrick Lamar collaborator Tom Carmichael and Pulp bassist Steve Mackey. You can find the album’s tracklist and artwork and Jerkcurb’s upcoming tour dates below.
But first—give the new single a listen.
Air Con Eden Tracklist:
01. Shadowshow
02. Somerton Beach
03. Timelapse Tulip
04. Wishbones
05. Air Con Eden
06. Midnight Snack
07. Morpheus’ Arms
08. Water
09. Aquarena Springs
10. Voodoo Saloon
11. Devils Catflap
12. Night On Earth
Air Con Eden Artwork:
Jerkcurb Tour Dates:
October
11 – Bristol, U.K. @ Rough Trade
13 – Manchester, U.K. @ YES
14 – Leeds, U.K. @ Headrow House
15 – Glasgow, Scotland @ Hug and Pint
17 – London, U.K. @ Chats Palace