It's sonic, it's electronic, it's sometimes scary but we don't mind. Hailing from Greece (Opa Re!), Apu Nanu’s debut EP The Untold Saga is a hot-handed fusion of industrial scrapings, symphonic sirens, post-internet aesthetics, and gamespace evocation. 

While Nanu professes the record reminds them of Minecraft, I feel it would be a disservice to my hungering heritage if I did not explore a deeper allusion. Best put by the video game God of War (2018), “The Gods are more than capricious; they are the architects of our suffering and our glory.” In this sense, Nanu assumes a role akin to Hades, the ruler of the Underworld. (Please note Christianity’s trespass over mythology; the Greek underworld encompassed the whole afterlife, containing both heaven and hell, much like the duality Nanu presents us with). The push and pull between abrasive glitch and gentle acoustics unifies the record. Lush melodies coupled with gritty electronics yield an unorthodox textural contrast, and like Nanu’s employment of warped samples and unconventional time signatures, it disorients, yet intrigues. Comforts, yet frightens. 

Opener ‘First Pages’ lulls us into the netherworld through a delicate, atmospheric piano motif. As dynamics gently swell and legato strings glide, Nanu navigates unexpected harmonic shifts by way of modal interchange, finding depth and vulnerability in a solitary moment. ‘The Journal’ feels kinetic by comparison, a minor-key shift that blends operative rhythms and layered electronic percussion to evoke what I imagine it feels like to be a caterpillar forming its cocoon (...if that caterpillar was on caps). Then ‘Lockpick’ is an industrial nightmare. The track is a metaphorical key, unlocking barriers between the organic and the simply unnatural. The rich, resonant timbre of its piano stands in stark opposition to the surrounding swamp of electronic sludge – an intentional sonic murkiness that reflects the lament of the lost soul. Somehow, the music still flows forward, courtesy of polyphonic harmony and syncopated rhythms whipping the viscous textures into something that can be moved through.

The intensity of The Untold Saga’s sound continues through its mid-section: the hurried violins of ‘The Fountain’ evoke digital quicksand, while the undulating waves of violent percussion on ‘Inner Core’ are enough to induce a fight, flight or freeze response. But the music remains ever punctuated by space and silence; at their most urgent, Apu Nanu trades in microdoses of brittle tension and gasping relief. It is something of a kindness, then, that the EP concludes with a ruminative composition in ‘Rare Items’. Nanu returns to introspection with a wandering, bashful piano movement continues purposefully on its path despite the presence of some upsammy-esque digital trickery. It seems to signal the rebirth that accompanies closure of a personal journey that made it through an inferno.

As keeper of lost souls and harbinger of rebirth, Hades is an honourable figure maintaining balance in the afterlife. In so doing, he has a kindred spirit in Apu Nanu, whose arrangements are pristinely graceful and coarsely synthetic in equal measure. Their interplay between harsh industrial sonics and delicate melodies mirrors the complexity of human experience, opening up to a spectrum of emotions that encompass both the unnerving and the profoundly beautiful. Με αγάπη για την πατρίδα*, I proudly affirm this EP attests that Nanu is one to keep an eye on.

*With love for the homeland

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Georgia Dedes

9 October 2024