SG63: Darksoft - Grayscale [LP]

Having released 6 albums and 11 singles/EPs as of 2024, Darksoft knows how to gorgeously amalgamate dream pop, shoegaze, and jangle pop into one stunning package. The Portland, Maine based multi-instrumentalist released one of those packages in 2023, titled Grayscale. Darksoft explained the intention behind the album as well:

“In our saturated and confusing post-digital lives, I think it’s easy to see an allure in fading into emotionless sameness and minimalism. The thing is, in doing so, you lose humanity, vibrancy, and uniqueness. Throughout Grayscale, I question these ideas in some songs (see “Bubblegum,” “Only Human”) and embrace them in others (see “Less Is More,” “So It Goes,” “Whatever Happens”). But the album isn’t 100% about all that. There are references to the sun, fully automated luxury communism, life in the PNW, and other ideas. Like I said, it’s a gray area.”

There is an impossibly balanced sense of calm and elation throughout Grayscale, alluding to the indeterminate state of the in-between, and yet simultaneously drawing attention to its inherent potential that lies within its expanse. “Less Is More,” despite its gesture towards minimalism, is ironically one of the most full, lush tracks on the album; tracks like “All Your Little Cares” and “Only Human” offer more of a nuanced approach. By the closer “You Never Know,” it’s more than apparent that Grayscale is an album that, in its passive acceptance of time, actually stretches it into a vast horizon of perpetual renewal.