Revanchist https://evianchrist.ffm.to/revanchist (October 20, 2023) - Revanchist, the long-awaited debut album by Evian Christ, is released today on Warp Records. Evian is currently on his worldwide tour and will be playing his only US date in New York City tonight.
The eight-track record explores the latent potential in trance to evoke, beyond euphoria, the fullest feeling of the sublime. Revanchist draws from an unlikely and diverse pool of influences, compositing the suffocating throttle of Demiurge-era Emptyset (2011), the worldliness of Madonna and William Orbit’s Ray Of Light LP (1998), the acute uncanniness of Laibach’s Across The Universe (1988); and a highly stylized approach to mixing and sound design primarily inspired by Sasha’s seminal Xpander EP (1999). "On Embers," Revanchist’s opening track and lead single, perhaps best encapsulates Christ’s inclination towards the total annihilation of trance’s default effects: soaring supersaws meet their match in a brutal environment dominated by incessant waves of indecipherable noise, mangled 808s and broken shards of Defected Records gospel house acapellas. "Yxguden," a collaboration with Drain Gang’s Bladee, provides a frenetic counterpoint to the album's darker and more controlled moments. Accompanied by a music video directed by early computer graphics pioneer and Tiesto-collaborator Micha Klein, "Yxguden" soundtracks an animated meeting between an anthropomorphised peanut and a Nordic Bronze Age cave drawing of an axe-wielding moundperson. "Nobody Else" shows reverence to classic Balearic trance and its associated imagery — a widescreen view of a supermassive Iberian sunset; Apocalypse Now meets Café Del Mar. Its spacious breakdown, featuring an unrecognizably washed-out rendition of Clairo’s "North" submerged in the undertow of crashing waves, provides one of Revanchist's most strikingly fragile moments.
"Yxguden" is accompanied by a music video directed by early computer graphics pioneer and one-time Tiesto-collaborator Micha Klein, who choreographs a meeting between Drain Gang’s Bladee and a Nordic Bronze Age cave drawing of an axe-wielding Moundperson. Utilizing a vocal hook most commonly recognized for its use in DJ Hixxy’s “More and More," "Yxguden’s" chaotic arrangement jump-cuts between moments of gauzy ambiance and frenzied exhilaration. On "Run Boys Run," the album's resolution, Christ summons an enraptured chorus of bending strings and soaring choral threnoi that ebb and flow before dispersing away from a single sub-bass note, sustained to exhaustion. Revanchist’s album artwork, designed by David Rudnick, features a hand-drawn depiction of a newborn child forged from crystal against a backdrop compositing Lars Hertervig’s Gamle Furutrær (1865) and a still from Chris Bucklow’s Jerusalem (1994). The album was mixed and mastered by Chris Pawlusek and Christ in Goa, India.
Evian Christ (b. Joshua Leary) is an Ellesmere Port-based musician, producer, and music programmer signed to WARP and DONDA/Sony ATV Publishing. Initially recognized for his production contributions to Billboard-topping albums by Kanye West and Travis Scott, and subsequently as the founder of the enduringly influential TranceParty event series, Christ’s recent years have seen him lead an idiosyncratic range of projects that enquire into the legacy of trance in contemporary cultural life.
Listen to Revanchist above and find full tour routing and album details below.
Upcoming Live Dates † = Revanchist: Live * = Revanchist: DJ
10/20 - New York, NY @ The Meadows * 10/26 - London, UK @ TranceParty Outernet † 10/27 - Brussels, BE @ Botanique † 10/28 - Amsterdam, NL @ Parallel † 11/3 - Turin, IT @ C2C † 11/4 - Guimarães, PT @ Mucho Flow † 11/11 - Barcelona, ES @ Mira † 11/25 - Manchester, UK @ New Century † 12/1 - London, UK @ TranceParty Corsica * 12/8 - Glasgow, UK @ Stereo * 12/9 - Dublin, IE @ The Racket Space * 2/24 - Bristol, UK @ Simple Things Festival | 
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