A Beat For Your Thoughts

Every Color of Darkness has come out as a companion EP to Prefuse 73’s other recent EP Forsyth Gardens and the album Rivington Não Rio. Having all three pop up after a couple years of being dormant seems to be Prefuse 73’s style, as these random pops of creativity get reflected in the music that is found on Every Color of Darkness.

The EP continues to explore the idea of broken jazz and how this experimentation can become more of a concrete style. Throughout the album, there is a solid, consistent beat that provides something for the listener to ground themselves back on so they do not lose themselves within everything else. The chance to get lost comes from the spastic pops of melody and counter melodies. Within every song, there are breaks of what sounds like a jazz band tuning up; sometimes there are vocals that come in played backwards though. Some tracks sound like they are starting at the middle of the song.

Two songs to definitely highlight, though, are “Night of Light” and followed by, “Contour of Every Pitch.” “Night of Light” is the only song on the album that does not feature any jazz-sounding sections. The song sounds more like a contemporary DJ piece than anything else, though it still has the broken quality the rest of the album has. With the removal of the jazz piece, the song sounds a lot darker than the others. This is contrasted nicely by “Contour of Every Pitch,” which plays immediately afterwards. Perhaps it is because of the placement of the songs, but “Contour of Every Pitch” comes off sounding jazzier and brighter than the rest of the tunes.

The music can be confusing upon an initial, casual listen, but Every Color of Darkness holds a lot of qualities similar to modern art and that confusion is intended. Modern art, especially cubism, seems like a bunch of random pieces at first that do not make up any kind of image. With the understanding that every piece is supposed to be a different perspective, the actual image can appear. Every Color of Darkness cannot be listened to in a “regular” linear way. Each song is a whole song, just each bit of jazz or vocals describes that song in slightly different ways. Prefuse 73 navigates this idea successfully and makes Every Color of Darkness a thought-provoking album.