JH1.FS3 - Trials and Tribulations (2019)

Emotional exploration through sound can become so indulgent that it overshadows the journey. JH1.FS3 eschews mining the human condition as mediation, opting for nuanced analysis rather than vanity. Using the seeds of improvisation as their root construct, the duo work without code, vocabulary or genre. Instead, they systematically work as individuals in tandem, using disparate and varied sounds and sources to create gauzy collages of ideas, sound and visceral sense reaction.

Comprised of Frederikke Hoffmeier (Puce Mary) and Jesse Sanes (Liebestod), JH1.FS3 delineates a more subtle “cinema of the ear”, and a cold approach to reflecting on experience without leveraging tropes or familiarity.

“We try to reconcile these emotionally massive things in a way that is sincere and measured, but without being sappily diaristic or confessional,” they explain. “A cinematic quality develops really quickly and our attempts to traffic in generalizations, unbiased observers of ‘relationships’ gets turned on its head. We find these sets of unique errors that feel more like Super-8 (film) home footage.”

This transference allows cracks and fissured to be filled in new ways, where error is championed—highlighted as intention rather than happenstance. Throughout Trials and Tribulations, their debut LP for Dais records, the reconnection of idea and experience conducted with surgical diligence becomes a mode to deconstruct familiarity through shade and accident.

With each exposition on Trials and Tribulations, the duo ornately explores the relationship between space and time by reconfiguring the tendrils and fissures that bind them. Percussive oscillations, descant vocals, and deconstructed patterns create fields that vibrate, plunge, and drone. Sequentially, each track contributes a lucid vignette to the larger account, engaging the listener to query where, when, and how they’re being driven. The contrast of the lead single “Aleppo In Headlines,” with its thrusting syncopation to the cautious beauty of “At the Bottom of the Night” compounds and depth and disquisition of the duo’s process.