Throwing Snow declares the death of pragmatism on his new EP for Houndstooth.
Off the back of his killer album release, LOMA, Throwing Snow returns to Houndstooth for a fiery, politically charged EP; The Death of Pragmatism.
As tension continues to rise in the UK around the Brexit debate, Throwing Snow channels the aggression into a 4-track release - showcasing some of his most intense work to date. To be released on the 1st November, the day after Brexit is executed, the EP opens with a percussive-driven record ‘Nought To Gain’. The idea is built around Ross Tones (AKA Throwing Snow) looking into the dramatic system modifications at play that change landscapes as a whole and when ’the supposed benefits of that modification no longer apply as there is now a different structure in place - there is nought to gain and all to lose’.
The second track, ‘The Righteous Mind’, is named after Jonathan Haidt’s book subtitled ‘Why Good People are separated by Politics and Religion’. ‘His approach explains the current schisms and could act as a mediator for angry voices’, Ross says, giving a better understanding of the single as it allows for a moment of reflection before leading into ‘Ideolog’ - an ominous soundscape circling back to Throwing Snow’s half time DnB influences.
‘When staring into the abyss, a great orator speaks of utopias and rose-tinted cocoons. Ideologues are intrinsically reductionist, degrading the complexity of every single issue. Meshed interrelations are ignored, in favour of quasi-religious furore. Basically, it’s a shit idea to follow them’.
Rounding off with ‘The Death of Pragmatism’, a climatic syncopated record focused on glass-shattering beats and piercing synths, Ross cites the world of Gödel and unyielding ideologies which suffer from their complex consequences. ‘Assessing the foreseeable aftermath within a broader context is a map through the madness. Otherwise it’s the death of Pragmatism’.
The artwork features Phillippa Battye’s sculptures representing a concept. ‘The shape will look different depending on the observer’s position, which is isomorphic to viewing a debate or issue from different ideological standpoints. Different moral axioms result in different vistas. The sculpture is both block rectangles and warm circles.