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Aug 02, 2021 Web Exclusive By Mark Moody

Say what you will about the evils of music streaming platforms and paltry artist payouts. Certainly inequities need to be addressed, but if not for the digitization of music and its ability to be delivered instantly across the globe, there is no doubt fewer artists would get noticed if limited to distribution by old school physical media. Into this arena enters Moscow’s Apollinariya Kaspars, here performing as Settima Tacca (Italian for Seventh Notch if Google Translate is doing its job). Kaspars operates from her home studio, accompanied by two ’80s era synths, an upright piano, and her expansive imagination.

The six song mini-album Wondrous Feelings of Ages Long Gone hardly feels like a debut, and benefits particularly from its sequencing and nuanced production. Kaspars starts with a couple of flights of fancy. On “Butterfly,” she imagines herself as the winged insect of the title, first whimsically (“I want to be a butterfly and ride a little cat”), but migrating towards a cycle of death and reincarnation as the song unfolds. Distant sounding minor key piano notes drift along with the synths adding an air of post war melancholia when they chime in. “Retro Space Weapon” comes as close as the album veers to addictive pop territory. Trashed out drum machine beats underpin our heroine seeking “tenderness and love” with a phaser in her right hand.

Although the first three songs of Wondrous Feelings make for an able introduction to Kaspars’ talents, she hits her stride in the linked trio of songs that close out the album. “Last Wonder” is a brief, but exploratory mission in putting her machines through darker paces. Corrosive notes appear, sustain, and decay in layers, recalling early synth bands, like OMD, figuring out just what emotions could be milked from circuit boards.

“Last Wonder” gives way to the compelling coupling of “The Well” and “Why Heal a Wound?” Though the instrumentation holds its own and recalls the more melancholy moments of Cat Power’s Moon Pix, it is a handful of Kaspars’ lyrics that truly devastate. “The Well” brings us, “I sing of love, like a million other voices,” to point to the oft-felt futility of trying to make your way in the industry. But “Why Heal a Wound?” Is the album’s true tour de force. The song goes through several space age phases, that recall the reincarnation themes of the opening track. But Kaspars also begs the simple, yet profound, stunner, “Why heal a wound? That makes you love me.” The emotional impact of the line hits like one of The Flaming Lips’ wide-eyed, humanistic observations, and like that band often does, the outro of “Why Heal a Wound?” looks to a far away place of hope without ever uttering a word.

If you are a follower of new music, it’s no doubt in quest of those rare moments of new found discoveries. Early in her career, Kaspars has created a short album with limited instrumentation that entertains, provokes thought and true emotion, while also begging the question of what else might be out there amongst the stars waiting to be found. (www.soundcloud.com/settimatacca)

Author rating: 7.5/10