What To Make Of These Mortal Hands

Dis Fig, producer and vocalist Felicia Chen, embraces every facet of heaviness. Chen is driven by a desire to express deeper emotions through meticulously crafted, innovative production and expressive vocals. On acclaimed collaborations with The Bug, The Body, and Asian Dope Boys, Chen’s sound is indelible. Her solo work utilizes electronic, industrial, and bass-forward music as filters for sonic plentitudes, unbounded and wholly her own. Every granule of sound is in service of alchemizing intense emotion and vulnerability. What To Make Of These Mortal Hands is an ambitious widening of Dis Fig’s scope, traversing tectonic dynamic shifts and heartrending arrangements in a filmic study of humanity’s capacity to create both beauty and devastation.

The album’s worlds are built within an architecture of fierce bass, sub-frequencies, and an array of distortions and electronics, laid atop Chen’s versatile voice. No stranger to extremes, Dis Fig finds new, exciting combinations and balances to expand her form and shape the sound of her new record. “A throughline for me is trying to create a womb-like chamber through sound,” explains Chen. “I wanted this record to feel like stepping into its own distinct world. It’s meant to be a portal with a guide, taking your hand and inviting you in with care.” 

The opening of "Psaltery" employs the titular instrument in pensive plucks along with mechanical clinking and tentative murmurs before giving way to an increasingly potent kick pattern and shrieks bent by distortion. “Vorago” draws the listener in as if descending into a volcano of moaning strings until magmatic waves crash in all directions. The raw power of Chen’s voice on its own is showcased on pieces like “Ginko’s Way” and “Mystic One,” the former moving in lush choral harmonies while the latter narrows focus on a lone voice with distant piano. The album crests around the massive crescendos of “The Snake You Built” featuring contributions from Lee Buford of The Body on drums and Liam Andrews of BIG|BRAVE on bass. “I’ll See You In The Burning Sun” finds Chen sorting through the wreckage in search of glimmers of light.

What To Make Of These Mortal Hands is structured as scenes; in each, Chen reckons with the capacity of humans for destructive tragedies and revelatory marvels alike. Chen’s voice intones an insatiable, searching quality as electronics burble and settle in fits, while featured artist the wind between (Eldon Somers) acts as a narrator, setting the stage. “Ginko’s Way” serves as a brief respite before ushering in the cathartic second act. On “The Stone Awakens”, LUηG (Cameron Tanaka) and Chen trade harsh screams, acting as kindred forces on a shared battlefield. In the album’s closing vignettes, Chen is neither relieved nor resigned. Instead, she harnesses tenderness and a sense of hope that rings defiant.

Dis Fig has a preternatural ability to ground massive sounds with tactile rhythms and her instinctually connective voice. What To Make Of These Mortal Hands charts a cinematic arc exploring a complex web of feeling with extraordinary purpose and focus. Chen’s curiosity unearths ecstatic and absorbing environments. The album is a staggering display of innovative songcraft and unfathomable emotion – a musical world like no other.