January 28, 2019

A Whimsical Return for Buke and Gase

Their music is as vibrant and provocative as ever.

Album Review

Buke and Gase
Scholars
Brassland

On their first album in five years, Arone Dyer and Aron Sanchez—a.k.a. Buke and Gase—mix sweetly enticing noise and unsettling sentiments with expert finesse. Tangy and tantalizing, Scholars is bright, jittery art-pop, stuffed with twisty melodies, elusive lyrics and playful electronic effects, but it’s never clever for its own sake. Underneath the irregular beats and fractured arrangements, lovely (albeit warped) tunes await, while no amount of distortion can hide the distress in Dyer’s languid vocals when she sings, “Too much grip cuts circulation/And I’m numb from your needing,” on “Grips,” or observes, “I find it hard to care the way you are,” in the title track, adding, “I met you by bad choice.” While Buke and Gase have moved on from the eccentric homemade instruments that defined the duo’s early work, their music is as vibrant and provocative as ever.

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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

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