Post-metal act Night Movies have released a hypnotic video to accompany the track III, taken from their album Transportation Two which was released today.
Watch the video below.
Speaking of the video, Director Ralf Fuller says: “The video is an AI fly through of a landscape that I think looks like computer servers. But it’s ambiguous enough just to hold your attention. It was played back through a CRT and distorted using the TVs functions.” While Fredrick says: “My brothers Grain Freeze studio handles all my videos, this ominous sci fi imagery and mix of digital and analogue textures worked with the huge saturated tones of the song.”
Informed by the work of Stars of the Lid, Jon Hassell, Hiroshi Yoshimura and the guitar work of Mike Einzenger, Alan Sparhawk, Justin Broaderick and Dylan Carlson. Transportation Two was originally a reaction to experiencing the immense atmospheric sound design of the fi lm Dune 2. ‘Desert Peace’ being the initial working title.
Most of the album was created in series and based around the key of C, a natural starting point. Originally a nod to Terry Riley’s ‘in C’ and wanting to explore the repetitive sound of other minimalists such as Steve Reich. Shortly into production it was a conscious decision to switch this up, make the guitar the primary instrument, keeping minimal and exploring the less is more approach to recording.
Live performance and hardware were preferred over software synths and midi. Eff ect pedals were used as the main source of sound manipulation, tube pre amps and power amps for tone amplifi cation, speaker cabinet impulse responses and spacial reverb plugins for mixing . No microphones were used. Most pieces were recorded with a fair amount of immediacy, the bulk of recording lasting a couple of weeks in the Spring of ‘24 and the fi nal two songs in the Autumn. The Strymon Cloudburst and Deco tape eff ects were used throughout, turning a Yamaha CP electric piano into a textured choir of synths and the electric guitars into an ensemble of strings.
The Transportation series by Night Movies has mainly a ’70s to ’80s ambient or new age feel, but this release moves further into the avant garde metal and industrial realms, especially when hearing the Alesis HR-16 drum machine and drone riff of ‘III’, evoking the sounds of Godfl esh and SunnO))).
Transportation Two’s sound is much more expansive in scope than previous EP ‘Transportation One’. The latter had a more specifi c awareness, contextualising sound with spaces and modes of transport. By using classic ’80s synths such as the Yamaha DX7 with Brian Eno-esque shimmering reverbs, ‘One’ was an outwardly sounding EP, whereas ‘Two’ is much more inward and introspective in feel. Two is harder to pin down to any one era of infl uence, with it’s wider use of tones, extreme use of faux tape manipulation, downsampling to 16bit and the use of brand new reverb algorithms. Transportation Two looks further into the future, while simultaneously keeping an eye on the past.
Frederick Fuller produces and plays on the majority of the album, but three other guitarists feature throughout. April Roots lends her skills as the lead guitarist on the spaced out ‘II’ while Frank Horovitch (This be the Verse) and Rufus Miller (Sting/Solo artist) perform all guitars on the mammoth drone industrial song ‘III’ and the melancholic chamber like ‘V’.
The album is presented in two versions, one unedited full length singular track version, and another (Songs Version) edited down into 7 main songs.
Produced and mixed by Frederick Fuller, released worldwide digitally through his own Soundmaker Records label on March 28th 2025. ‘Visitor’ (2021) cover painting by Richard J. Butler. Mastered by Grant Berry at Fader Mastering.
