Smezkh
It’s Friday so we’re listening to something more upbeat. Today we’re listening to Smezkh, a Ukrainian electronic musician from Kremenchuk. “My relationship with music started when a friend from school gave me a cassette with The Prodigy album on it,” he told A Closer Listen; “it was back in the 90s and it split my life into before and after.”1 He started listening to electronic music on local radio and eventually got a computer and started making his own music. He’s been actively involved in Ukraine’s underground scene, in his hometown and Kyiv. We’re first playing his 2024 EP, Joyful & A Little Sad, which could be called ambient techno, with an emphasis on track texture, but also leans into synth arpeggios on a couple tracks. The EP includes three remixes. We’re also playing Polissia from 2022, which uses more percussion and reminds one of the industrial origins of techno. The title means “woodland” in Ukrainian.
Joyful & A Little Sad EP - Smezkh (41m, no vocals)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / Tidal
Polissia - Smezkh (34m, no vocals)
Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube Music / Amazon Music / Bandcamp / Tidal
Have a nice weekend.
A part of the excellent Ukrainian Field Notes series