Hot Salvation

On this album, listeners delve deep into a spectrum of sensations, from the transmission of pain to moments of beatitude, mirroring the myriad experiences of a single day. "N E U R O" stands as the inaugural album by CURA MACHINES, a fresh endeavour by Daniel Lea. His compositions, simultaneously scientific and poetic, intricately capture the dynamic shifts within our cellular structure and the expansive landscapes of a contemporary urban milieu.

The moniker CURA MACHINES finds its origin in a sign encountered by Lea during a visit to Ancona, Italy, at an abandoned hospital: "Prima E Dopo La Cura" (Before and after the cure). The essence lies in the sound between these states, where what was lost or found is transmuted into heavily manipulated, pulsating synthesisers—a restoration of sorts. With a mix that's physically visceral courtesy of Ben Frost, and the addition of Yair Elazar Glotman's re-amped bass textures that soar, the album brims with transmuting arpeggios that tremble, oscillate, and ascend into fleeting sparks of brilliance.

Reflecting on Rilke's musings from the turn of the 20th century, where he envisioned the suture patterns of fused skull plates as potential gramophone records, each person possessing their own tonal source code etched onto their skull, a track like 'Suture' emerges—a sound that embodies the close-up excavation of the neural brain casing, stitched and sewn together in ephemeral pulses of whispers and alarms. The individual is laid bare, solitary yet not devoid of hope.

Alternatively, the album offers a soundtrack akin to the solitude of a melancholic private eye—a pulp novel set in a future era of neurosis or washed-out euphoric beauty. Tracks like 'Terminal Zone' or 'Inversion Layers' evoke imagery akin to celluloid frames flickering to life. The narrative could easily fit into a sci-fi, paranoia-inducing tale of brain emulation, transhumanist transgressions against humanity itself. After all, this is Lea's sonic depiction of Los Angeles—the city of angels immortalized in countless films: the racing tracking shot of the 2nd Street Tunnel at night, the freeways sprawling like lit-up veins and arteries. The final track, 'Zosa', delineates the boundary between day and night, where lunar strains wane, tides recede, and the city awakens.