Hualun - Tempus (2023)

Unlike their recent improvisation series “wʌndərlænd” and “Scene” which dive into the unexpected moments of their daily lives and sound experimentation, or their widely-acclaimed film scores for “An Elephant Sitting Still” and “Wuhan Wuhan” which are pensive, meditative and precise, “Tempus” makes a very friendly and energetic gesture, asserting where Hualun, as a group of music deviants that have been constantly refining and re-inventing their own sound for nearly 2 decades, stand at the very moment. A sense of purpose can be easily felt through the dedicated selection and editing of the improvised materials, the condensed song structures, as well as the thoughtful sequencing of the tracks: Hualun conjure up a vast expanse of wilderness, which gradually becomes the backdrop for running horses, forests, manufacturing lines, TV screens, city lamplights, and sceneries of the decaying societies - it is as much an ode to the evolution of human civilization as a funeral toll for the uncertain future.

With the surprising presence of various rhythmic elements, the use of sampling, and most importantly, the vivid live instrumentation they honed during countless nights of closed-door improv sessions, “Tempus” is everything but a reoccurrence of any existing genre. Hualun's musical roots such as krautrock, punk rock, and experimental electronic music are fused with ambient, hip-hop, and even dance music that the city-dwelling members are (in)actively exposed to in the modern-day life environments, and thus melted into a "unperiodizable" amber of pure energy and excitement.