Kelly Kirwan
The opening to "Bystander" is a series of high-decibel synths, as if we were running our palms across a dashboard of digitized buttons. This latest track off Poppy Patica’s new album, Tripping None, is just a sampling of a genre that’s a spinning wheel of punk, pop, and the experimental. Spearheaded by Peter Hartmann, this independent project has now evolved into a plush, 80s-tinged landscape, with a few cameos from musicians on DC’s indie scene.
This retro electronica that dominates "Bystander"’s opening also serves as the introduction to the entire album. It sets the tone, a little metallic riff that comes to us as pseudo-futuristic. The song then melts into thumping percussion and a jangly ambiance, as if the instruments were swerving off-key, threatening to wane away. Hartmann’s vocals have a slight nasal resonance, floating in a high octave that has subtle hints of a psychedelia. As the song propels onward, his voice takes on a lower, more earnest timbre, and with all the surrounding cacophony it’s a sly feat that his lyrics aren’t lost in the fuzzy, off-pitch surges of guitar and bass.
"Bystander" is a song that thrives off static, as if the plug on the amp were wriggling loose and filling the track’s nooks and crannies with crinkling white noise. If we could trace our fingers along the melody, we may just feel that quick electric shock against our skin, adding a little Einsteinian volume to our hair. It’s an enrapturing case of coloring outside the lines that’s true to Poppy Patica’s style, and only he can pull it off quite so seamlessly.