Diamondstein
Leisure & Industry
First ListenFirst, the full album.
15 tracks, 67 Minutes
Fully Continuous.
Produced and Written by Diamondstein.
Mixed by Trayer Tryon.
Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri.
15 tracks, 67 Minutes
Fully Continuous.
Produced and Written by Diamondstein.
Mixed by Trayer Tryon.
Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri.
A Brief Explanation
of the Concept
Behind Leisure & Industry
During the height of the pandemic, I was invited by Bandcamp to participate in the launch of their livestreaming platform. Myself and a small handful of other artists including Mary Lattimore, Juliana Barwick, etc. were to perform individual sets to help launch the system and give our audiences awareness to its functionality. Having already performed many livestreamed sets up until that point, I decided to do something different and score a film. After some deliberation and consideration of films specifically in the public domain, I decided to create something to accompany the 1929 Soviet classic Man with a Movie Camera.
What resulted was this album, Leisure & Industry.
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Man with a Movie Camera is a brilliant film that captures the whimsy of a day in motion within a functional, almost autonomous society. For me, it feels like watching a beautiful machine at work, even in its moments of sadness and anguish, it all captures what rhythmic urbanity should feel like. There’s a cycle, weighing the balance of collective and individual work, with collective and individual play. At the time, it was filmic propoganda for utopian Soviet communism. Through the lens of contemporary conflict, malaise, confusion, and sorrow, it feels similarly utopian and collectivist. It feels hopeful but oddly fictitious. For me, it feels like science fiction, though it wasn’t that at all, which is what I find so attractive about it. Where much of my music taps into the rust and loneliness of dark corners off the main strip of neon urbanity, Leisure & Industry is about whimsy and fluidity, collectivism and the joys of simplicity.
It’s muted but colorful, with sun stains instead of the runoff from overflowing gutters and unkempt garbage pails. It’s utopian instead of dystopian. It’s a new territory for me, and something I want to be able to access when I most need to, and latetly, I’ve needed to.
What resulted was this album, Leisure & Industry.
Man with a Movie Camera is a brilliant film that captures the whimsy of a day in motion within a functional, almost autonomous society. For me, it feels like watching a beautiful machine at work, even in its moments of sadness and anguish, it all captures what rhythmic urbanity should feel like. There’s a cycle, weighing the balance of collective and individual work, with collective and individual play. At the time, it was filmic propoganda for utopian Soviet communism. Through the lens of contemporary conflict, malaise, confusion, and sorrow, it feels similarly utopian and collectivist. It feels hopeful but oddly fictitious. For me, it feels like science fiction, though it wasn’t that at all, which is what I find so attractive about it. Where much of my music taps into the rust and loneliness of dark corners off the main strip of neon urbanity, Leisure & Industry is about whimsy and fluidity, collectivism and the joys of simplicity. It’s muted but colorful, with sun stains instead of the runoff from overflowing gutters and unkempt garbage pails. It’s utopian instead of dystopian. It’s a new territory for me, and something I want to be able to access when I most need to, and latetly, I’ve needed to.
Album & Film Sync
About Diamondstein
Host of Night Shift on NTS Radio, Diamondstein's dark and typically melancholic mixes and productions create a cinematic soundscape to everyday mundanity.
Raised in a small Appalachian town on the West Virginia border, Diamondstein now lives in Los Angeles, where he's been a constant fixture on NTS Radio since its first days in LA. His monthly two-hour show Night Shift is a sort of audio accompaniment to the artwork of Edward Hopper and the flashing fluorescent signs of truck stop adult bookstores, typically featuring everything from black metal to ambient piano expressions and field sounds. His guests are equally as diverse and have included the likes of Marie Davidson, Deafheaven, Headless Horseman, Anna Von Hausswolff, Alexis Marshall of Daughters, Siavash Amini, and 404.zero to name a few.
His various releases and contributions on labels such as Doom Trip Records, Dream Catalogue, Pure Life, Infiné, Orange Milk, and BLCR include an equally as cinematic and often times brooding quality, having been described as "the perfect soundtrack to the dark underbelly of a melancholic future dystopia tinged with just the right amount of doomed romance." His 2018 LP Reflecting on a Dying Man was a complex homage to his Appalachian roots and father, a coal plant engineer, who died years earlier from a degenerative disease.
His various releases and contributions on labels such as Doom Trip Records, Dream Catalogue, Pure Life, Infiné, Orange Milk, and BLCR include an equally as cinematic and often times brooding quality, having been described as "the perfect soundtrack to the dark underbelly of a melancholic future dystopia tinged with just the right amount of doomed romance." His 2018 LP Reflecting on a Dying Man was a complex homage to his Appalachian roots and father, a coal plant engineer, who died years earlier from a degenerative disease.
“Romantic, ambient garage from two of the best producers operating in the post-vaporwave sphere.” - Resident Advisor on Diamondstein & Sangam’s Collaborative Releases
“Diamondstein creates sci-fi soundscapes that blend the lines between Detroit’s techno underworld and the evocative soundtracks of independent film.” - XLR8R
“The materials are stripped back but what they lack in layers they more than make up for in atmosphere. Stick this over top of your late night dashcam footage and BOOM! all of a sudden you’re Nicolas Winding Refn.” - The Wire
Final Thoughts
Leisure & Industry has been a completely unique record for me, and a project I’m deeply proud of both because of the process it took to complete, but also because I feel that it captures a wimsy in the mundane that feels important during our stretched time. I think it’s important to share the record with a partner who believes in its interpretative intention. I am looking for a label and distribution that can help contextualize this album to a global audience, even if small, who appreciates its purpose. While many aspects of this album are atypical, particularly for what I’ve historically produced, I also feel that it opens up a new way for me to construct audio stories to visual accompanimnet, and I hope that it connects with you in a way that leaves a lasting impression.
- Ben