From the burgeoning expanse of Iran’s electronic and experimental soundscape comes the latest project from practitioner/sound artist Shahin Entezami aka Tegh. Collaborating with fellow Tehran resident, violinist Adel Poursamadi, a player steeped in classical Iranian music, the pair are set to release the intensely emotive Ima ایما album via Injazero Records (due 22nd July).
As a solo artist Tegh has been realising a consistent stream of expansive works since the melodic swell of 2015’s undulating ‘Night Scenes’. His last release from 2019 ‘Unusual Path’, may have been more granular and unstable but the ferocity of the prolonged drone form still allowed the listener to come inside. So exploring that emotional connection further through this new electro-acoustic partnership with string-maestro Poursamadi on Ima ایما , feels like a natural step forward.
First preview piece from the album, Ijād ایجاد, signals the potency of this transition. Frantic and urgent from the outset, the looping electronic arpeggios shape shift deceptively to visceral, insistent string patterns. There’s a deep, cavernous bass warning at the centre of the sound as the orchestral swell reaches not so much a point of decay but an intentionally disconcerting circuit scramble for the tune’s close, Tegh/Entezami has said the track ‘attempts to define a new particular type of feeling’ and uncannily it does.
Signalling more music for a different future, the full ‘Ima ایما’ album experience awaits and it’s too enthralling not to be in the queue.
You can preorder Ima ایما by Tegh & Adel Poursamadi from: https://tegh.bandcamp.com/album/ima
