After recently covering Whettman Chelmets’ album Long Read Memories – an intense and highly personal album based on the artist’s brother committing murder and being imprisoned for life – it feels fitting to follow with the new album from Diamondstein. The Los Angeles-based electronic musician, whose album The Ridges was a cult hit a few years back, has also turned to the topics of death and family for his latest album, Reflecting on a Dying Man.
In 2015, Diamondstein learned that his father had little time left in his battle with Lou Gehrig’s Disease, so the artist made the long drive from L.A. to West Virginia to be with him. This inspired a daring and wide-ranging album of cinematic hard techno, moody ambience, and vocodered voices, which successfully captures the sad subject matter but also the urgent excitement of a cross-country drive.
In his own words, Diamondstein explains:
“Reflecting on a Dying Man isn’t about death so much as the emotional and intellectual experience of witnessing it. Each song represents a moment of clarity in the experience—lucid realizations that you become susceptible to when the man you know better than anyone is steadily fading away on the floor below. Some dark and driving, some thoughtful and saccharine, and some overwhelmingly moving because each is what death feels like when you have the time think about it.”
Watch the videos for “Someday You’ll Have This Too” and “Antique Stores” below. You can grab the album digitally or on CD via Doom Trip Records.
Diamondstein also has a monthly show on NTS Radio.
Reflecting on a Dying Man Tracklist
01. Since The Beginning
02. Someday You’ll Have This Too
03. Chemical Valley
04. Antique Stores
05. School Town Cinema feat. Tommy Goodkin
06. 2nd Floor Studio feat. Jamie Thomson
07. Chasing Cops
08. Rumors Of Crime
09. The Mountaineer feat. Sheenah Ko
10. Cold To Touch
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