Osheyack - Intimate Publics (2022)

Intimate Publics, Osheyack’s second album, is an homage to Shanghai, the city he has called home since 2012. Over the past ten years the producer has evolved from an avid club-goer to a key member of the vital soundscape that emerged from ALL Club and its predecessor, the now defunct club The Shelter. As hinted by the title, which draws on American social theorist Michael Warner’s work on publics and counterpublics, the album expresses a commitment to mining the utopian potential of club music, forging new worlds and generating future social relations, just as the artist bids farewell to the city at a moment of uncertain transition. While tracks like 'Edging' and 'Thrall' continue to present his signature collage of harder club music, the rest of the record reveals a shift to synthetic approximations of acoustic instruments. 'Still', the central track of the album, is a piece composed almost entirely of samples found on Vocaloid (a vocal synthesizer developed by Yamaha, commonly used to give voice to Japanese virtual idols). While echoing themes explored in previous projects, like the nature of realism and authenticity in a techno-mediated landscape, Intimate Publics is charged with an unexpected emotional candor and vulnerability, unveiling a personal side Osheyack is only beginning to explore.