Atlanta multi-instrumentalist Herman Martinez has a gift for turning turbulence into art. With his new album ‘UltraTerrestrial’, he’s built an otherworldly document of that process. Written and performed entirely by Martinez, then shaped in collaboration with producer Ahmed Mahmoud and engineer Chase Cassara, the record feels like an act of transmission- songs that feel almost summoned.
The record quickly establishes its thematic heartbeat: dislocation, identity, and the search for meaning in an apathetic world. The first single, ‘Changeling’, embodies this perfectly. It wrestles with the unsettling moment of not quite recognising yourself, yet it channels that discomfort into something strangely empowering.
Across the eleven tracks, Martinez plays with scale and scope. ‘Thagomizer’ crashes down with the heavy swing of prehistoric rhythms, while ‘Smudge’ dissolves into a woozy, blurred palette where melody and noise intermingle until the edges disappear. The title track ‘UltraTerrestrial’ sits at the record’s core, offering both a meditation and a mirror- Martinez confronting forgotten dreams, half-remembered stories, and ghostlike memories that drift between consciousness and static.
But there’s light among the shadows. ‘Sol’, one of the album’s most luminous pieces, shifts the perspective toward renewal. Its glowing layers feel like the warmth of sunlight breaking through stormclouds, a moment of hope among the chaos. Later, ‘I Hope Something Good Happens to You Today’ closes the distance between the cosmic and the personal, delivering a fragile kindness at the heart of an otherwise stormy collection.
UltraTerrestrial is unpredictable, jagged at times, achingly delicate at others. Martinez doesn’t iron out the rough edges; he leaves them in place, proof of the madness and spontaneity that shaped the sessions. Each track breathes like a living organism, pulsing with imperfections that make the whole more human- even as the record gazes toward frequencies and worlds beyond our own.