Following the release of their dazzling debut ‘Ephemeral, Basal’ in January, Copenhagen-via-Berlin production duo Ignacio Córdoba & Agata Ciurkot return with a haunting visual companion to close the chapter – directed by Córdoba on the stoic banks of the river Rhine.
The album, a spectral braid of neo-classical, dub-shadowed drone and eccentric ambient theatre, feels like the fever dream of a sleep-deprived inventor. Ciurkot’s piano glides like moonlight on water, while Córdoba manipulates homemade oscillators.
Shot amidst the scorched summer of 2016, it follows a cruise ship gliding past jagged cliffs under an ash-grey sky. Gradually, ghosts of West German architecture emerge, flickering monuments to the corrosion of time – inhabited by a motley squad of seniors, each locked in their own ritual of memory. For Córdoba, these drifting images lingered for years before anchoring themselves in ‘Ephemeral, Basal’. He comments:
“The music video floats sideways in the liquid mixture of the duo’s sound. It was shot by Córdoba on the Rhine River in Germany during the summer of 2016 and waited silently for years to find its right soundtrack – until now. The hypnotically flat view of the Rhine Valley flows slowly and heavily, unbothered by the sparse human presence that seems to almost drift through it. Córdoba’s camera rested flat on the edge of a boat window, floating parallel to the hills along the river. The shot is so tightly zoomed that the different layers of vineyards, trees, and houses almost appear superimposed, like a digital collage. But what we see in the frame is, in fact, a single uninterrupted shot captured during the boat’s short journey toward the German Black Forest. The video was shot, directed, edited, and color-corrected by Ignacio Córdoba himself, who has worked as a director, camera operator, and editor for nearly 20 years, creating music videos for Spanish alternative artists and bands such as Aries, Encono, and More.”
‘Ephemeral, Basal’ is out now. Order a copy from Bandcamp.
