Lara Sarkissian creates a home for her collected passions on Remnants

Her music making has evolved, mutated, and emerged more fully formed as she’s made her way through various single and EP releases and now her passions are rendered carefully and more complete on her debut album, Remnants.

Known for her pioneering electronic compositions, the Los Angeles-based artist and co-founder of Club Chai takes her production to the next level here, building on her Armenian heritage and experimental soundscapes. In Remnants, Sarkissian invites listeners into a world where layered electronics and ancient musical traditions coexist, guiding them through a journey as much introspective as it is bold and assertive. Traditional and organic instruments rub shoulders within the digital realm, occasionally uneasy but always fascinating as a result. In previous releases, including her critically acclaimed EPs "Disruption" and “Born of the Sea” Sarkissian introduced her ability to weave Armenian folk motifs with throbbing bass lines and abstract beats. On Remnants, this fusion intensifies, pushing genre boundaries with hypnotic drum patterns, manipulated vocals, and undulating synths on the likes of “Zepher” and “far from the eye, far from the heart”.

The album doesn’t merely dip into Armenian sounds as an aesthetic choice; instead, it uses traditional instrumentation - like the duduk and zurna - to create an unflinchingly atmospheric listening experience that feels almost ritualistic right from the opener “Heaven, or Paradise: and Hell,” featuring acclaimed Paris-based player Adrien Soleiman. The languid, building layers sound like stacked generations of music from ancient to futuristic.

“Our Dead Can't Rest (Old Jugha Flute Dance)” hovers, ghostly with glitches and subdued beats that gain momentum to free themselves from history. The dialogue between then and now is already an obvious part of Sarkissian’s mission statement.

Tracks reverberate, and vocals drift like apparitions, conjuring memories of places and people long gone. Sarkissian’s approach to production here is meticulous: each sound carries weight, and every beat feels intentional. Much of the album moves with a meditative quality, demanding attentive listening and leaving room for introspection but also blends in an industrial tone at times. Sarkissian has long crafted music that confronts identity and diaspora, and on Remnants, she seems to be asking what fragments of cultural memory can remain in a constantly evolving world.

One standout, "Miracle," serves as both a lament and a release, capturing the tension between inherited trauma and self-reclamation as if revealing the uncertainty of displacement and the struggle for cultural preservation in her work, and here, she doubles down on those themes. The track is sparse yet stacked, with ambient sounds and subcutaneous beats that rise and fall like breaths. On “Unravelling (Interlude),” a distorted vocal loop appears, chanting in Armenian - a stark reminder of voices lost or forgotten, now recontextualized in a genre that feels distinctly modern and universal.

While Remnants is undeniably cohesive, its dense production can occasionally blur the lines between tracks, creating an almost overwhelming sonic field. It’s obvious why Sarkissian has chosen this moment and this music to release on her own imprint - btwn Earth+Sky - which she sees as a place to encourage collaborations between musicians and producers and prioritize sound in visual arts spaces.

For some listeners, this might feel more atmospheric than narrative, leaving the thematic thread loosely tied. But Sarkissian’s commitment to crafting an emotional journey through sound cannot be denied, and in many ways, Remnants benefits from its ambitious sprawl. By the time we reach "..nothing matters more than touching you although I haven't touched you yet," the closing track, there’s a sense of catharsis but remaining empty. The album's conclusion doesn’t resolve everything, but it doesn’t need to; like memory, it leaves fragments of melodies lingering.

As a project, Remnants is an impressive testament to Sarkissian’s ability to meld cultural legacy with experimental sound. To some, it may seem like a challenging listen, occasionally esoteric, but for those willing to engage deeply, it offers rich rewards. In an era where electronic music often prioritizes commercial accessibility, Lara Sarkissian has crafted an album that is profoundly personal and unapologetically complex. Remnants is not just an album – it’s a romantic rebirth, rebuilding with an optimistic eye in a world of uncertainty where the past, present, and future coexist and inform each other. It chooses hope over darkness.