Laika Speaks - Red Rocket Right Return (2019)

Modern composers, from Holst to Suzanne Cianni to Sun Ra, differ in how space is represented sonically. There are as many interpretations as there are composers willing to engage the search. A common thread weaves between them: space created instead of space filled. The sounds of space are limitless in a vacuum. But how can they be experienced if not from a safe haven? Laika Speaks, so named for the famed Russian dog, approaches this question with a minimalist approach to modular synthesis and a healthy dose of electronic delay. Their debut album,
Red Rocket Right Return, is an interpretation of the sounds of the cosmos as imagined through the perspective of the titular Sputnik canine; a record that questions just what Laika might have heard during her journey around the Earth. Additional inspiration comes from from a truly eccentric grab bag of sounds, including Space Race-era satellite transmissions, morse code, and
HAM radio. The listening experience of Red Rocket Right Return is evocative of drifting, the isolation of space travel, the lonely emptiness of the unknown, and the vastness of the universe.
An album for the Voyager Spacecraft in your life.