Queen of Heaven is the first major release from SoCal based Andrew Eastman, otherwise known as Echavox. His music has been gaining a consistent amount of support online, which eventually led him to catch the attention of Portland based beat collective STYLSS. After being featured on a few of the collective's compilation releases, Andrew finally had the chance to putout his debut record for your listening pleasure.
This full length release is easily his most ambitious work yet. From the shattering bass sounds to the ambient soundscapes that transition the concepts, this feels diverse yet consistent in its shades of angst.
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The title track begins extremely minimal with a gloomy chord progression played on acoustic guitar. The lyricism suggests confusion and frustration, a theme that follows along the rest of the album. The simplicity of this first song feels as though Andrew is putting his emotions out for the world right from the get go. There aren't any vocal effects or intense layering like most of his songs, rather this one remains calm in an effort to introduce his ideas in the most personal way possible.
I admire Queen of Heaven because of the intimacy in each track. Whether we're listening to an instrumental beat or a ballad, he is able to captivate the listener into a world of subtle textures and harmonic delicacies that feel extremely surreal in a way that is both dark and beautiful.
In my opinion the record reaches its peak at the second to last track 'Resolution', which has one of the most interesting sample arpeggiations that suffocates the listener with waves of voices. The line "can you take me to your palace..." is first introduced in the intro to the record but in 'Resolution' it is brought back, this time with a demonic low pitched quality. It is the perfect connection between the start of the album and the end. The track builds into an intense industrial house beat that feels like the final battle between emotions.
Overall this release proves the amount of power that can come from bedroom producers with the right ideas. The sound design on this feels artistic in of itself whereas Andrew's vocals and arrangement creates something that feels organic and larger than life. After hearing him put out countless singles and stunning music videos, it felt great to finally have a solid full length from this ambitious producer. We're glad that it received as big of a release as it did through STYLSS and we can't be more excited to hear what Echavox has in store for the future.