Blizz

On his third album Blizz, Munich-based drummer and producer Simon Popp further blurs the line between electronic and organic sounds. In carefully crafted, slow-growing tracks, tuned metal percussions cut through searing synth pads, sucking the listener into a sonic vortex. Informed by personal and spiritual themes, Popp’s debut Laya and his 2021 follow-up Devi make use of rhythms as storytelling mechanisms. Contrasting light and dark, organic and synthetic sounds, his compositions engage in a dance of subtle complexities, enticing the listener into close listening. Throughout Blizz, a panopticon of metallophones takes flight, floating freely over earth-bound counter rhythms, conjuring up call and response techniques inherent in polyrhythmic music. This technique favors experimentation over perfectionism, leaving space for happy accidents to unlock new melodic possibilities. For Popp, “it’s much more interesting to push the boundaries of an instrument to see what’s possible.”