It’s been a while since the stunning New Mexican duo Tan Cologne released the brilliance of their debut album ‘Cave Vaults on the Moon in New Mexico’ back in 2020. One of the outstanding releases of that year, I called it a thing of ethereal beauty, saying that there was something in the spaces between the echoes and the jangling guitars, the languid distant voices and the reverb-drenched waves of sound that evokes space and time: a mystical geography and the tyranny and joy of distance.
Tan Cologne are back on duty and their new single ‘Topaz Wave’ installs the same feeling of joy and reverie as their previous material. There is always something unearthly about the sound Tan Cologne create: ‘Topaz Wave’ starts with a circular mesmerising jangling guitars and languid distant vocals – layered and mystical sounds that are enticing and immersive.
The band says of the track:
The song carries a memory of surfing in a red tide algea bloom with the waves flickering and illuminating the ocean energy. We wrote the song beside an arroyo, a dry river bed, in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico. The sides of the arroyo walls are shaped like curved waves – reflecting the experience of tidal and earth transformation, and how the desert land was once ocean.
The reverberated and haunting guitar riffs that ebb and flow throughout the track are delicious: organic and haunting and capturing the stark geographical terrain.
The mysticism and magic flow into the evocative video directed by Carly Short:
Ethereal and beautiful, ‘Topaz Wave’ is available now through all the usual download/streaming sites.
Signed to Labrador Records, 2022 will see new music from the duo. Tan Cologne will also have a forthcoming residency at Pescetrullo in Italy and live dates later in the year.
Tan Cologne is the duo of Lauren Green and Marissa Macias, based in Northern New Mexico.
Feature Photograph: Marissa Macias
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