One For is a musician who studies trombone at NEC but whose real instrument and compositional tool is a Gameboy. All sounds heard on this album come from a Gameboy. The music is very complex compositionally with some unique and pretty melodies and some extremely fascinating harmonies that utilize drones, grooves, and chord changes that completely change the tone of the melodies. The register used is very diverse with a lot of top keyboard notes and other notes that are very low pitched.

A couple of the 12 songs found on One For’s new album Our Lady of Sorrows have some really cool drum beats,  all of which are constructed entirely out of white noise because it’s all old school Nintendo sounds! I don’t fully understand the technology behind how he’s doing everything, but I know that every single sound comes from the Gameboy somehow. Unlike most electronic music, there isn’t a lot of looping if any at all (at least it doesn’t feel like your typical loop usage), and perhaps he just uses triggers more than anything. The sounds will bring you memories of Super Mario, but the compositions can be so complex that it will make you forget about video games at times. At other times you may see visions of Super Mario suffering from severe depression and maybe even self harming because of how dark some of the songs feel. There’s a very dark tone surrounding the whole album, even on the more upbeat songs, which I enjoy a lot. The bass parts really add to the darkness of these songs. Not surprisingly the bass parts are my favorite parts of these songs, especially the way that they contrast with the melodies. The titles of the songs are curious, conjuring interesting visuals for each track. Overall I’d say that it feels like a mix of Aphex Twin, and Schoenberg doing drugs in an 8-bit universe. I heavily recommend listening to it at least five times!

– Fat Shuggy