Eager Atom

“Extrastatecraft by Eager Atom is a meditative study on dystopian infrastructure and alienation that reveals itself most saliently through the unmistakably retro-futuristic sound of analog synthesisers and the haunting sequencing of the tracks.

As two of the song titles indicate, the album is punctuated by ambiance, allowing for pockets of focused introspection within an otherwise dynamic sonic space.

Eager Atom uses persuasive layers of loops to investigate the gradual deterioration of post-apocalyptic cities, all the while rewarding the attentive listener a rich tone sensibility. In an album that’s predominantly instrumental, such a thematic feat is undeniable yet unsurprising when considering the artist’s background in computer programming. Indeed, with the droning crosscurrent and pulsating heartbeat that underlines the album, it incites a calculated response, urging the listener to explore and reflect on the abandoned cityscape. With seven technically impeccable songs to its name, Extrastatecraft is an urgent and prophetic soundtrack to the dystopian future that warrants many replays.”

Listen to Extrastatecraft on Spotify

Artwork by the talented Anouk Dijkstra.

Alongside working with various ensembles, bands, and projects ranging from drumming in local progressive rockbands to developing ambitious performance art pieces for international conferences, Gydo Keijzer (1993) ceaselessly kept at his individual music projects, most recently culminating in Eager Atom.

Atmospheric, brooding, synth-heavy, and yet undeniably keen, Eager Atom’s polyrhythmic grooves and counterpoint melodies reflect an interest in the unexpected potency of the post apocalyptic; despite promises of a dystopian future, the tracks retain an optimism derived from 90s house and IDM. The name “Eager Atom” is the outcome of an algorithm, written by the composer himself, that generates iambic word pairs out of a list of words taken from his personal notebook.

Gydo Keijzer grew up in Groningen, where he studied Afro-Cuban drums and met with fellow progrock enthusiasts. He discovered his love for electronic music when he was fourteen years old. For Keijzer, Groningen still functions as the hub where his ambitions as a composer, drummer, and producer intersect.

In 2011 Keijzer moved to Utrecht to partake in the pilot course Musician 3.0 at the Utrecht University of Arts, from which he graduated in 2015 with the performance art piece “System 1 & System 2”, executed by Gydo Keijzer and Thijs Keulen. This graduation project granted Keijzer a much sought-after place in the Honours Programme for Young Artists and Scientists at the Royal Netherlands Academy for Arts and Science. In Oktober 2016, Gydo accompanied Tet Koffeman in representing The Utrecht University of Arts at the “Arts Without Borders” conference in Helsinki.