This Is Our Jam: Pictureplane, “Post Physical”

Criticism of digital communication has become something of a platitude, reserved for media psychologists’ armchair discussions of a certain beleaguered congressmen. For better or worse, we take our gadgetry for granted; the technology of intimacy has become part of us all. Or, as Pictureplane puts it, “We are all post-physical.” Pictureplane has continued to evolve his fractured, rave-indebted decoupage to a more song-oriented synthpop. “Post Physical” is drenched in decayed atmospherics and pedal effects whose begrimed textures support the desperately oppositional nature of modern desire: “And we are real, you’re not inside me.” The track owes more to M83's synthpop/shoegaze blend than house music, but the rhythm and heart is still rooted in dance. Post-physical as we may be, there’s a lot to be said for analog human connection, something that Pictureplane—along with the rest of us—seems to be groping for desperately.