Marabou’s work rests in a balance between two worlds that do not often share common ground.

While carrying electronic rhythms and textures, this mysterious project from Toronto is also a very cinematic expression, with acoustic strings that solidify the project’s sense of grounding and tangibility.

With Soft Machine, the undertaking’s latest work, additional textures from a synthesizer further carry the work into an ethereal space.

The two-song release, published last month, begins with the title track, a joyful combination of drum machine and acoustic fingerpicking.

The piece progresses forward with a rapid tempo that conveys a journey across a far distance. With the high tempo, it is a journey that is done at a rather rapid pace.

These decisions evoke images of bullet trains traversing great distances and aircraft cutting through the sky above a lush landscape at low altitudes.

The project’s clean production and compositional minimalism bear within them a sense of modernism that further encourages this imagery.

The next track, “St. Paul’s, Montreal,” offers this same artistic vision with a distinct decrease in tempo.

A deep, open piano, reminiscent of soundtrack work, further emphasizes the cinematic characteristics of this instrumental music.

This aesthetic is further embedded as plucked strings return in duet with the shimmer of a synthesizer. This relationship is held throughout the piece as it comes to an abrupt end.

This new undertaking from Marabou represents the artist’s continued process of establishing their unique futurist sound. Although it keeps to the project’s existing catalog, which has been steadily growing for the past half-decade, this new venture indicates that its creator is heading toward motion at an expeditious pace.

The pairing likely serves as a barometer of what to expect from this artist in the coming months. 

If that assumption is correct, get your dancing shoes ready.