There’s something inherently unsettling about music that sounds like it was transmitted rather than recorded. Glaring, the project of Anna Nin, understands that feeling well. On Life on Other Planets Is Difficult, coldwave, minimal synth, post-punk and industrial electronics become the vocabulary for a world that feels familiar enough to recognize, but alien enough to distrust.
The record moves through stark drum machines, skeletal electronics and detached vocals, creating a sense of isolation without sacrificing its pulse. There’s darkness here, but it isn’t theatrical; Glaring’s restraint makes the atmosphere feel more intimate, as though we’re hearing someone trying to communicate from the wrong side of a technological divide.
Originally released as an eight-track album, Life on Other Planets Is Difficult returns in an expanded 17-track edition via Marguerite Records. The additional material only deepens the record’s peculiar sense of distance, turning what might have been a collection of coldwave exercises into something closer to a sustained transmission from somewhere just outside our orbit.
For listeners drawn to minimal synth, cold electronics and the more introspective edges of post-punk, Glaring offers a welcome reminder that alienation can still be danceable.
Previously released on August 1, Life on Other Planets Is Difficult returns October 12 via Marguerite Records in an expanded 17-track edition, adding nine new tracks to the original album. The expanded release is now available for pre-order via Bandcamp.