Unda Fluxit - Stone Ringing Sorrows CS (Ever/Never, 2022)
"You’re an artist. You find yourself a refugee in Boise, Idaho. What do you do? Certainly not stew about. You make music. You paint. You make connections. You translate. At least that is what Huma Aatifi has done. Recording as Unda Fluxit for the second time and hopefully not last on this here cassette.
Unda Fluxit is exactly what it sounds like. Incomprehensible but familiar. A translation, not of words, but of feelings. In motion. Always on the go . Trust your gut and move when & where it tells you. Fluxus. Fluxit. Fuck it. Armed with a dangerous curiosity and fealty to no person, place , band or scene, Huma and her guitar, guided by her voice shed light upon the lands over the course of 8 tracks recorded in early January, 2021 that make up ‘Stone Ringing Sorrows.’
Frustration meets liberation on downtown folk opener ‘Callous Umbrella’ , “is that a bongo ?” Second track ‘ Chance Of The Towel’ doesn’t travel too far uptown but a little VU-influenced strum peeks into the drawn shades. ‘Sunset Rain’ sounds like a song passed down from mother to daughter. A whispered lullaby of the sadness brought to life here. ‘The Airplane, Sky, Ocean, Pane’ with its detuned guitars and flat line vocals bring to mind the (non)-placed musing of Jandek. Side 2 opens with the mysterious words & soft strum of ‘Well Now What’ . No answers are given. Nor should they be. ‘AghaAsman’ & ‘Two Drunken Dollars’ follow down the path of dissonance, longing for lost homes (metaphoric or otherwise) ,displacement and the (un)fortunate inability to control nature , or much of anything really. Final track, ‘ Chasing The Wind’ , a song about Afghanistan , finds Unda translating the natural into song. A gentle suggestion? A command to take what you want? We know The Wind does. Why shouldn’t We? Perhaps within ‘Stone Ringing Sorrows’ you will find the answer." - e/n