Uncomplicated melodies and sweet vocal harmonies are couched in hypnotizing drum machine loops, waves of heavily effected guitars and analog keyboards to create an atmospheric, textured and dense dream pop sound.

5 MP3 Songs in this album (29:26) !
Related styles: ROCK: Shoegaze, POP: Dream Pop

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Details:
ask for joy is a songwriter, performer and producer in Austin, Texas. Making heavy use of lush, long reverbs of repetitive guitar chords and minimalist, simplistic drum patterns, the music draws comparisons to early 1990s shoegaze-era bands such as My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, Cocteau Twins, et cetera. However, many musical styles and earlier influences inform ask for joy's music:

'When I was growing up, I was the weird kid that didn't listen to the pop and rock music that my friends and classmates did. The first band I really got into was Simon and Garfunkel. The songs were simple and catchy, but most of all the harmonies were stunningly beautiful. I have always loved sweet, treacly harmonies in music. It wasn't until much later in life that my musical tastes broadened to include many other artists and genres of music. Part of what drew me so strongly to dream pop was a marked similarity to the beautiful chord progressions, lilting melodies and harmonies of the songs I loved listening to as a child and teenager. Combined with layers of effects and textures that give everything an otherworldly, dream-like quality, it's not hard to see how I would fall so hard for it.' - ask for joy

Uncomplicated lyrics, melodies and sweet vocal harmonies are couched in hypontizing drum machine loops and waves of heavily effected guitars and analog keyboards to create a druggy, atmospheric, textured and dense dream pop sound. The music seeks more to envelop and to inspire a mood in the listener than to tell a story. It is best experienced listened through headphones, allowing for the different layers to be better perceived.

Endless Space Unfurled is a five-song EP consisting of music put to the words of various poems by American lyrical poet Sara Teasdale (1884-1933). Teasdale's ruminations on love, life, death and the unhappiness she felt in her marriage find sympathetic and complementary musical settings in ask for joy's songs. The tracks range from the poppy, densely layered guitar fuzz of 'To-night' to 'Peace', whose gentle two- and three-part harmonies float underneath undulating waltz time guitars and give voice to the tranquility Teasdale identifies in love through the use of water imagery.

Taking his name from a want ad looking for roommates, ask for joy began recording his songs on a four-track recorder in 1995 and distributing cassettes to friends and family. Never one for collaborating, he played all the instruments and recorded all the vocals by himself. His early recordings are crude but exhibit many of the same qualities that mark his music now--an emphasis on melodies and textures surrounded by layers of keyboards and multiply-tracked vocal harmonies. The same sense of rawness, wonder and DIY aesthetic that characterize the early four-track records can still be found in ask for joy's music to this day, making for an enlightening and revelatory listening experience.