Futura Resistenza / Belgium / 2025
Edge Games is the debut collaborative album by Berlin-based musicians Jules Reidy and Sam Dunscombe, long-time friends and artistic partners. The album features two expansive tracks blending Reidy’s microtonal guitar with Dunscombe’s dense sonic environments built from synthesis, field recordings, and clarinet. Their approach is deeply collaborative, described humorously as the work of a fictional merged entity, “Jam Dundy.” Dunscombe’s technique, rooted in “Mass Plasma Synthesis,” generates swirling masses of sine waves that create a disorienting but evocative soundscape, while Reidy’s guitar both complements and destabilizes this texture.
The album explores contrasts—cyclical vs. linear, static vs. active, sacred vs. profane—often playing on the metaphor of “edges.” The two tracks, “Gracelords” and “Dancing Anyway,” differ in mood but share a commitment to pushing sonic boundaries. The former is shimmering and meditative; the latter is visceral and chaotic. Despite its conceptual rigor, the music is immersive and powerful without needing theoretical background. At its core, Edge Games is a fearless exploration of musical and conceptual thresholds, reflecting both artists' resistance to fixed forms and boundaries.