I first heard Danish electronic band, Future 3, as they opened the 2002 Morr Music compilation, Blue Skied An’ Clear, a tribute to seminal shoegazers, Slowdive. That record featured an impressive patchwork of glitchy, ethereal electronic takes on the music of Slowdive and served to accelerate my personal exploration and love of indie electronic music and—specifically—Plinkerpop.
As it turns out, their contributions to Blue Skiedwere their last official releases as a band.
Now, twelve years later, Future 3 is back with a characteristically sparsely beautiful record, With and Without. The album presents a consistently icy, musically frigid world. At the risk of coming off as overly pretentious, With and Without gives us the aural equivalent of a field of snow that’s so simple and clean, it’s perfectly beautiful. Quickly trilling harmonies are sketched out in chiming, churning electronics and rounded out with gently whirring keyboard chords and vocals that often meld together in tone and range.
With and Without is Future 3’s first proper album in 13 years as members Anders Remmer (aka Dub Tractor), Thomas Knak (aka Opiate), and Jesper Skaaning (aka Acustic) return from working on other long-term musical projects. The album title refers to the the two halves of the record: the first, With, featuring the band’s more vocal-forward collaborations with album guests Thomas Meluch (better known as Benoît Pioulard) + Anja T. Lahrmann (Ice Cream Cathedral); the second, Without, shows the band looking inward with more ambient, airy work written and recorded without guest contributions.
We’re a sucker for vocal-driven work, but, at the same time, it seems a shame not to feature a song from the album titled “August” in the waning days of that month.
So, courtesy of Future 3 and the band’s label, Morr Music, we’re happy to be premiering “August” by Future 3, a heady, glitchy, fun instrumental that provides a quick glimpse into the band’s musical aesthetic.
The album itself will be available stateside October 14 via Morr Music + iTunes and you can currently purchase “August” on iTunes. Head to Morr to listen to 90 second snippets of other songs on the album.
