Matmos : Announce ‘Plastic Anniversary’ LP, (made lovingly from plastic)

Plastic is that omnipresent substance in our lives we use for almost everything (99% being made from fossil fuels) and we typically don’t think of it in a sonic sense. Matmos is here to change that. The Baltimore-based duo (who recently celebrated their 25th anniversary together as a couple) solely used plastic to compose ‘Plastic Anniversary‘ reminiscent of 2016’s ‘Ultimate Care II‘ concept choice of using only a washing machine’s sounds. Instruments for this LP include: Bakelite dominos, Styrofoam coolers, polyethylene waste containers, PVC panpipes, pinpricks of bubble wrap, silicone gel breast implants and synthetic human fat, exercise ball, amplified DNA-kit, poker chips, a police riot shield, LEGO bricks, and an emergency stretcher. Perhaps the funniest plastic used on the dystopic record are fragments of broken vinyl records by the ’70s soft rock band Bread to create the dancehall track ‘Breaking Bread‘.

It’s highly suggested you read through the plastic-instrumentation details on Matmos’ Bandcamp page for more insights. And just when you thought the LP couldn’t be any weirder, it features plastic-drumming from Greg Saunier of Deerhoof and garbage bin-instrumentation from members of Whitefish, Montana’s Whitefish Highschool Bulldogs. Could this be the start of a new genre? The cover art, which you can find down below along with the album’s track listing & trailer, was done by Ted Mineo, the cover artist for ‘Ultimate Care II‘, and the back cover image, which features the plastic contents from the stomach of a Layman albatross photographed in an atoll near the Pacific Ocean Plastic Gyre, was taken by activist Chris Jordan.

‘Plastic Anniversary’ will be released March 15, 2019 via Thrill Jockey and you can catch them on a soon-to-be announced world tour.

Sarah Medeiros