Vinyl Williams brings us celestial psych wave to launch us into the weekend
I first became enamoured with the music of LA-based musician Lionel (Vinyl) Williams just after the pandemic. Near around that time he released his beautifully produced 10-track celestial psych-rock album entitled Aeterna.
I think what is striking about Williams is that it’s more than just his music. He has created a vast multi-sensory universe to compliment and enhance his work. He’s created seemingly endless 3D interactive worlds and videos to accompany his nine full-length albums to date. He’s also invented a system of understanding relationships called Musical Astrology. To bring that idea to life, he’s created an app which allows you to create relationships and hear the music of your birthdays. It also finds the precise musical pitches of the planets in relation to Earth on any given day. Check out the Musical Astrology app here.
Music apps, interactive videos, 3D worlds — it’s an immense body of work, but all the more interesting for his music to exist in the context of this world he has created. I think Williams describes it best when he calls it his “celestial city in the sky.”
This June Williams will release a double LP called Polyhaven / Portasymphony. The LP will include two full length albums — one lo-fi and one hi-fi. It will be a gatefold LP, with a lenticular hologram on the front which will twirl the image from left-to-right as it’s rotated.
The first single to be teased off the album was called “Find the Hidden” and it took a slice of warped pop from the hi-fi side of the album. Now he’s released a second teaser; this time from the lo-fi side of the album. The single is called “Sunshine” and it sees Vinyl Williams’ vocals take a back-seat to layers of psychedelic instrumentation. It provides the rays of sun one would expect from his music. Perhaps it takes inspiration from a summer in 1975 instead of 2025.
Stream “Find The Hidden” and “Sunshine” below. If you are into it, head over to the Vinyl Williams merch page to pre-order Polyhaven / Portasymphony today.
