{"id":5398,"date":"2025-09-23T15:55:00","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T15:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/sam-prekop-open-close-album\/"},"modified":"2025-09-23T15:55:00","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T15:55:00","slug":"sam-prekop-open-close-album","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/sam-prekop-open-close-album\/","title":{"rendered":"Sam Prekop Stays Modular On New Synth LP"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.spin.com\/files\/2025\/09\/unnamed-1-4.jpg\" width=\"\" height=\"\" alt=\"\"><\/figure>\n<p>Sam Prekop may be most familiar to astute listeners as the frontman of eclectic Chicago band the Sea &amp; Cake, but he\u2019s also built a robust catalog of modular synth-driven projects as a solo artist and in collaboration with Sea &amp; Cake drummer John McEntire. The focus remains electronic on <em>Open Close<\/em>, due Friday (Sept. 26) from Thrill Jockey, many songs from which were written for recent live performances with ambient legend Laraaji.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI felt it was a good idea to get this stuff recorded, because a lot of work had gone into it for it to just dissipate,\u201d Prekop tells SPIN of <em>Open Close<\/em>, which revels in layered grooves and ever-morphing soundscapes. \u201cThe basic arc and flow of the record is there from the live set, but I added quite a bit as well that I couldn\u2019t\u00a0pull off live.\u201d One example is the heavily overdubbed middle section of \u201cLight Shadow,\u201d while \u201cPara\u201d and \u201cOpera\u201d were written later \u201cin response to what I felt was missing from the record.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>More from Spin:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.spin.com\/2025\/07\/road-work-noah-kahan-mmj-tortoise\/\">Road Work: Noah Kahan, MMJ, Tortoise<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<li>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.spin.com\/2024\/07\/the-10-greatest-ambient-tracks-of-all-time\/\">The 10 Greatest Ambient Tracks of All Time<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<li>\n\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.spin.com\/2019\/05\/laraaji-npr-tiny-desk-concert\/\">Watch Laraaji\u2019s Tiny Desk Concert<\/a>\n\t\t<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u201cThe main sequence\/body of \u2018Light Shadow\u2019 is very minimal \u2014 for sure not more than two chords. I find sequences that work like this fascinating in that for me, I just don\u2019t get tired of listening to them, which I take as a good sign,\u201d Prekop says by way of explaining what he loves so much about working with modular synths. \u201cIt has taken me a while to realize that a certain \u2018musical\u2019 complexity is not always the most interesting route to take. The sequence felt so malleable and\u00a0seemed to work effortlessly with whatever I tried to layer above and around it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Prekop was initially drawn to the instruments during a period of frustration at his \u201csomewhat limited guitar-playing abilities. Messing around with modular synths just opened a whole new approach and sound world for me. It did, however, take years to figure out how to make\u00a0interesting music with this stuff, and, no surprise, it\u2019s just as challenging as playing a guitar.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<lite-youtube videoid=\"1pKiRW5DAZk\" style=\"bottom: 0; height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; right: 0; top: 0; width: 100%; max-width:100%;\"><\/lite-youtube>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Moving the music into a live setting has been part of that challenge, and Prekop admits he \u201cwasn\u2019t really that familiar with Laraaji\u2019s work\u201d beyond the beloved, Brian Eno-produced 1980 album <em>Ambient 3: Day of Radiance<\/em> before they teamed up. \u201cI went into it having no idea if it would work or not,\u201d he says. \u201cI spoke with Laraaji before the first show to strategize a bit and basically pick a key to play in. The first time we played together was at soundcheck before the first show. I think we were both relieved within the first five minutes \u2014 we could tell it was going to be fine and I was really quite surprised that what we do works together so well. Our performances also evolved in surprising ways.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Asked to compare <em>Open Close<\/em> to his 2020 solo LP <em>Comma<\/em> or his acclaimed 2022 McEntire collaboration <em>Sons Of<\/em>, Prekop sees a clear common thread. \u201c<em>Open Close<\/em>\u00a0is related to the\u00a0<em>Sons Of<\/em>\u00a0record with regard to process, as it was also developed from \u2018live\u2019 recordings, but John and I added a lot to it in the studio,\u201d he says. \u201cThe long forms of the pieces are related as well.\u00a0How they unfold over quite a bit of time, which references back to what happens live, is something I\u2019ve been interested in taking on as a\u00a0challenge for a few years now. Playing modular shows with John for some years now has been great and it was super exciting to make a record together, which is something we had thought about since the beginning.\u00a0<em>Comma<\/em>\u00a0is more a traditional collection of \u2018songs\u2019 and in a way felt like a departure and a bit more \u2018pop\u2019 than my previous synth records. I think a big differentiation is I felt I could have sang on many of the pieces on\u00a0<em>Comma<\/em>. Maybe on the next one.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Prekop will celebrate <em>Open Close<\/em> with a concert tonight at New York\u2019s Public Records, and says \u201cthere are plans to do something with the recordings\u201d made during the prior Laraaji concerts. As for fans of the Sea &amp; Cake, which hasn\u2019t released an album since 2018 and has only played live on a handful of occasions since then, future activity will likely hinge on the availability of McEntire and bassist Doug McCombs, who are both founding members of fellow Chicago experimentalists Tortoise. That group\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spin.com\/2025\/07\/road-work-noah-kahan-mmj-tortoise\/\">first album in nine years<\/a>, <em>Touch<\/em>, is due Oct. 24 from International Anthem.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI do really miss playing in a \u2018rock band\u2019 and I have been thinking about singing more these days as well,\u201d Prekop concedes. \u201cIt\u2019s looking like John and Doug will be pretty busy with Tortoise for a while, but I do need time to come up with\u00a0new songs, so the timing might be just right. I\u2019m sure at some point we\u2019ll be getting something happening again.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>To see our running list of the top 100 greatest rock stars of all time, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.spin.com\/2021\/07\/the-greatest-rock-stars-of-all-time\/?utm_source=yahoo&amp;utm_medium=bottomlink&amp;utm_campaign=yahoolink\">click here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sam Prekop may be most familiar to astute listeners as the frontman of eclectic Chicago band the Sea &amp; Cake, but he\u2019s also built a robust catalog of modular synth-driven&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3858,3859,6,2684,3860],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-john-mcentire","category-laraaji","category-news","category-sam-prekop","category-the-sea-cake"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5398\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musictechohio.online\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}