Box5ive - Grey Space

Label: co:clear – COCLEAR002
Format: Vinyl, LP, Stereo
Country: UK
Released: Jun 14, 2024
Genre: Electronic
Style: Ambient, Experimental, Electro, IDM, Illbient

Teaming up with ascendant Glaswegian imprint co:clear, Box5ive’s debut album, ‘Grey Space’, presents strands of bass music interspersed with lush, atmospheric ambient. The album is an exceptional exploration and mixture of divergent electronic sounds that leaves a lasting impression.

‘Grey Space’ floats between mostly soporific ambient pieces and mid-tempo bass tunes with ease, with the opening duo of “Rough Sleeper” and “Sell a Door” setting the tone. The former drifts among beatless keys and effects, creating a hypnagogic mirage that’s gentle and inviting; the latter doesn’t introduce heavy beats like a maximalist dubstep tune, but it adds a new dimension to Box5ive’s arsenal.

The aesthetic of ‘Grey Space’ is a gorgeous hybrid of ambient and bass music that charts its own course and experiments with different forms. Box5ive fits in with the DIY, punk-like ethos of artists like Huerco S., his West Mineral Ltd imprint, and other tripped out labels such as 3XL and INDEX:Records: pushing ambient beyond the staid, placid tones of crystal strewn utopian retreats and further into a heady escape from the varied anxieties plaguing us every time we gaze out into the ever-warming environment and into our devices. It’s less music for airports as it is music for our scattered, unmoored psyches.

Review by Jason Cabaniss

A1. Rough Sleeper
A2. Sell A Door
A3. Sour Kiss
A4. In Grey Space
B1. Omni 74
B2. Blind
B3. First Name
B4. Stone