Usof

(This article’s English version was produced with AI-assisted translation)

There’s something in this new ambient dub current that recalls the approach of the Zero Decade, a pre-social era that feels both near and already mythologized, where artists exchanged information on Usenet and forums, imagining an open and limitless web. That vision has since transformed, reflecting in sonic aesthetics that describe a cyber-space with uncertain forms; solitude becomes a hypnotic mantra, a mental state to be shaped between screens and constant streams of stimuli, while music transforms into a digital refuge, a dematerialized aggregation. Usof, an artist based in Lisbon, explores these concepts through a vision of ambient music that breaks codes and reassembles a past that is both sediment and relic, between lost naiveté and newfound fascinations. From that era, he gathers experimental tension, the will to layer glitches and granular synthesis ("Imageboard"), a technique capable of breaking down the mother sound into microscopic particles to reorder it into organic, pulsating, and ever-changing textures.

The sonic translation of this philosophy is magnetic, a tender meditative embrace that digs its roots into the search for intimacy that is difficult to achieve. "Stay Longer" is the feverish hallucination of an alien who, while adapting to Earth, absorbs mostly its anxieties; it does not recognize itself in the world and seeks refuge in the depths of a bluish, contaminated ocean ("Skin Board") or amidst the debris of technology yet to be deciphered ("Pressured Water"). And yet, "Stay Longer" is not only a solitary odyssey: it is also a dialogue with the new ambient dub school, evident in collaborations with artists like Ben Bondy and Conna Haraway, prominent figures in the more crepuscular directions of the genre, who bring to life the more tactile and rhythmic executions of the work.

The journey doesn't always reach full revelation: whether bio-organic miasms or ectomorphic fluctuations, the sound designer's visions oscillate between magical realism and cybernetic delirium, an unfinished labyrinth of encrypted systems that sometimes fray before taking shape. But what remains is the sense of a path still in evolution, restless and filled with dizzying potential.

10/02/2025