Anonymity Spawns Creativity in Parannoul’s After the Magic

Parannoul defies definition. The mastermind behind the Seoul-based project lurks beyond shadows, basking in an anonymity that sheds further intrigue onto a project that is more than able to attract it based solely on the output they generate. This take on the image of an artist, one that almost entirely removes the identity of the person themself, is incredibly refreshing in an age of music where everything seems so dependent upon the cultivated algorithm-serving social media persona musicians must don. Parannoul forces the listener to focus only on the music itself, refusing any distraction or social pressure to influence the experience of an album. This was true for their 2021 breakout offering, To See the Next Part of the Dream, which saw Parannoul amass a frenzy of online acolytes from around the world. After TSTNPOTD’s release, Parannoul put out two more full-length albums in the same year, one, Let’s Walk on the Path of a Blue Cat (2021), alone, and the other, Downfall of the Neon Youth (2021), accompanied by similarly inscrutable Seoul-based artist asian glow (with whom they also released a split EP) and Brazil’s sonhos tomam conta. The following year saw them steadily release singles and EPs that further cemented the project’s uniquity and acclaim. 

On January 20th, a mere eight days before the album’s slated release, Portland-based indie heavyweight Topshelf Records announced that they would be issuing Parannoul’s newest record: After the Magic (2023), accompanied with a cryptic quote from the artist, “This album is not what you expected, but what I always wanted.” Needless to say, buzz welled up from the online underground. 

While true that this album does not sonically resemble To See the Next Part of the Dream as much as the past two years’ material has, it does clearly build off of the strong foundation that Parannoul has lain. Incorporating elements of shoegaze, psych pop, and good old-fashioned 2000’s indie rock, After the Magic steadily walks a line: it is by no means a return to form, yet holds the same charm and bombast that so immediately made Parannoul notable. Opener “Polaris” begins softly, over acoustic guitar, until it pivots halfway into a display of production and showmanship so massive it would put Turnstile to shame. This song is not an anomalous part of this album either, this is not “Pig” off of Sparklehorse’s Good Morning Spider, a red herring of an opener that belies the album whose doors it guards. Many songs on this album adhere to—and then deconstruct—this loose blueprint; seven-minute midpoint “Parade” opens with piano reminiscent of Vanessa Carlton’s “A Thousand Miles” as it steadily builds its layers before descending into fuzzy, melodic guitars interspersed with oases of calm. “Parade” ends three minutes in. Parannoul sits on their haunches for a moment before laying a quiet landscape of synths and sounds of the outside, all the while building up to a crescendo that doesn’t come—not before silence, at least. Then we are once again hurled back into the warmth and volume of the first half of the track. 

Although the lyrics are entirely in a language that I do not speak, the emotion that delivers each one forces across feeling like few other performances match. The ability to hear the vocals as another part of this vivid, surreal sonic landscape, rather than separate from the music itself, is a result both of this and the mixing practices Parannoul employs, calling to mind shoegaze staples My Bloody Valentine, while still operating far outside of the aural confines of the discipline. 

This album is not like anything else. While it clearly has a wide array of influences, it does not rest in any one of them long enough to be declared a ripoff. While it has propulsion and direction, it does not hurry itself, spanning just below an hour. Every sound, every vocal effect, every single production choice feels incredibly deliberate. After the Magic is nigh on immaculate in its crafting, yet it doesn’t feel synthetic. In part due to the raw screams that show themselves more than once over the course of the ten tracks (fear not, this is not a screamo record), in part due to the immense creativity that the weaving of every element here demonstrates, there is no hint of the soulless industry pandering that some music touts as chops. Here we see best the effect of Parannoul’s anonymity. Without the pressure that a persona inherently begets, they were able to, as they put it, make the album they always wanted. This record doesn’t, however, feel like it was simply made by a face behind a screen. Though almost every sound is digital, even vocaloid effects rear their not-so-ugly head, this album feels so intensely human. The absolute care with which each song was crafted, with which every sound was joined to another, could be nothing but. 

Article by Walker Price

Album Cover Courtesy of Parannoul & Topshelf Records