After the Magic - Parannoul (2023)
by Jaden Ellman (Dooley’s Deep Cuts)
When I put on Parannoul’s After the Magic for the first time and listened to opening track “Polaris,” it felt as if a version of me from another life had heard it a thousand times before. With its twinkling guitar chords, simple drum machines, and relaxed vocal melodies, the song instilled in me a sense of nostalgia for something I had never heard, for an era I had never experienced. I couldn’t even understand a word of what the anonymous Korean artist was singing, but something about the song still managed to captivate me almost instantly.
And then, halfway into the song, seemingly out of nowhere, the electric guitars came bursting in, and my jaw hit the floor.
After the Magic is an unapologetically gorgeous record. Like any good shoegaze album, it’s characterized by thick yet beautiful walls of sound, using layers of heavily distorted guitars to create a euphoric soundscape. However, unlike many of its contemporaries in the genre, part of what makes After the Magic so effective is its equal embrace of softer textures, resulting in tracks that are satisfyingly dynamic. This is precisely the magic of the aforementioned “Polaris,” which calls upon the acoustic stylings of 90s pop rock (think acts like Third Eye Blind or Semisonic) to welcome the listener in before setting the whole track ablaze in a mesmerizing eruption of sound. On “Insomnia,” reverb-soaked pianos seamlessly segue into blistering breakbeats and fuzzed-out guitars. Orchestral instrumentation even makes its way on a handful of tracks to accent this loud-quiet interplay, such as on “We Shine at Night”—the gentle string ensemble and choir vocals set the stage for Parannoul to shout his lungs out while drenched in distortion and other vocal effects, creating one of the most cathartic moments on the album. Likewise, penultimate track “Blossom” turns its irregular rhythms and glitchy percussion into an undeniable anthem complete with grandiose church bells and trumpets. In both its loudest and softest moments, After the Magic is a constant onslaught of earworm melodies and stunning sounds.
Despite the complexity of many of these songs, and even despite the language barrier in the lyrics, Parannoul has crafted a record that is astonishingly easy to connect with emotionally, and that’s thanks in large part to the abundance of clever soundplay throughout the tracklist. The emphatic and celebratory “Parade” slowly builds to a crescendo in its second half before the band cuts out entirely, leaving only the sound of distant fireworks in its place. After a few seconds, these fireworks make way for the drums, which are now heavily compressed to replicate the sound of the explosions, inviting the rest of the band back in for a triumphant final chorus. Similarly, the swaying rhythms on “Sound Inside Me, Waves Inside You” brilliantly emulate the motion of actual waves, painting a vivid landscape of a vast and mysterious ocean. On “Sketchbook,” layers of sound are slowly added into the mix as if they’re being drawn onto the page in front of your eyes, filling in the details that turn the song’s sparse, abstract opening into something ornate and vibrant. Subtle touches like these can be found in nearly every song on After the Magic, giving the record an almost cinematic quality. Each song feels like its own world to explore.
On the official Bandcamp page for After the Magic, Parannoul explains that the songs on this album were inspired by his own dreams. It’s only fitting, then, that the music itself sounds like a dreamscape. And for the hour or so that it’s on, I never want to wake up from it.