By Ian Bremner

With the general music landscape suddenly paying attention to ambient instrumental work, it feels like the proper time to discuss Dexter + Franz’ meditative debut record Flamingo Heights, released earlier this year on Nudie Records.

Recorded in June of 2022, John Dexter Marston and Mike Franz Novak took to a small recording studio in Joshua Tree called Flamingo Heights. The two artists tapped into the stratosphere and energy of the desert, of lost creators before then and the plants themselves. A creative collaborator from the desert Clive Wright introduced the two to the concept of connecting cacti and other plants to electrodes and could record the reaction to movement and sound. Recorded all on an Otari X5050 MKIII ½” 8-track, the record captures a moment in time, the sound of stillness and nature. Gongs, chimes, wurlitzers, autoharps birds sining in the distance all come together to create a soft cohesiveness that builds and builds over multiple listens.

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