This week’s release of Her Space Holiday‘s 10-track, self-titled album marks the end of the one-man musical project that Marc Bianchi started back in 1996. Fittingly, HSH’s final album is also the first on the Austin-based Bianchi’s No More Good Ideas label. While he has some live dates set to support the LP, the genre-defying musician mostly plans for the album to be the closing statement from HSH, who over the past decade and a half has also remixed tracks by the likes of R.E.M., Bright Eyes, Elastica and the Faint. Bianchi can now add MAGNET guest editor to his already-impressive resume, as that’s what he’ll be doing all week. Read our brand new Q&A with him.
Bianchi: If I had to choose one record that has inspired me to create music more than any other, hands down it would be Fantasma by Cornelius. In 1997, a friend sent me a cassette in the mail that had Stereo Total’s Monokini on the a-side, and Cornelius’ Fantasma batting clean-up on the b-side. I remember very clearly driving on 280 toward the city when the tape switched directions and “Mic Check” began. As soon the drums kicked back in after the “echo, echo, echo, reverb” break, it was like the world went from black and white to a hyper-vivid Technicolor. Each track pulled me deeper and deeper into the rich and vibrant soundscape that was unfolding before me. It was just as much a nod to the past (Pet Sounds, Phil Spector’s wall of sound, Sgt Pepper, etc.) as it was to the crisp digital age we were on the cusp of experiencing.Fantasma taught me what production and editing could really do. There were crazy stops and starts, blending of instruments and styles. But no matter how far Cornelius pushed it, he never allowed that color-soaked train to run off the rails. Everything always remained cohesive. In my eyes, Keigo Oyamada will always be one of the great composers of our time. And I will forever be grateful to him for making this record.
