Jacksonville references Richard Brautigan’s poem “All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace” in the title and title track of the forthcoming EP from Inner Shift. The poem was a wide-eyed, naive celebration of nature functioning as a machine in harmony with actual machines (or a searing parody of techno-utopianism circa the late 1960s):
I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.
These seem like nightmares now, but they actually did at the time as well – we just happen to live cheek-to-jowl with dystopian horrors only dreamt of in the California of 1967 and it feels a little more visceral these days.
None of that here: Jacksonville, whether in the spirit of Brautigan or just a new spin on the title has four tracks that wrap themselves around you and vibrate with warmth. The title track uses a short, distorted vocal sample as a fulcrum around which broken beats dance and chords dazzle. “Sebastopol Rd” on the flipside is a wonderful, restrained piece of deep house, the kind of thing that can be played early or late, with the sunrise or sunset to great effect.
Jacksonville: Machines of Loving Grace / Inner Shift
A1. Jacksonville: “Machines Of Loving Grace”
A2. Jacksonville: “Neptune 4”
B1. Jacksonville: “Sebastopol Rd”
B2. Jacksonville: “Fragment 7”
