How long should an album be? Most people would say around 30 minutes to an hour, maybe even an hour and a half. Although rare, some albums run over two hours long, such as Taylor Swift’s “Red (Taylor’s Version),” Tupac’s “All Eyez on Me,” and Swans’ “To Be Kind.” By then, most artists are finished with their albums.
“TECHDOG 7” is a four and a half-hour long ambient drone album by Patricia Taxxon, and it does not waste a single minute of its time. It is part of a series of albums, all getting longer with each release. It started as 25 minutes long with “TECHDOG 1,” then around 50 minutes on “TECHDOG 2,” and an hour and 10 minutes on “TECHDOG 3,” and so on until it reached four and a half hours.
Patricia Taxxon is a YouTuber who largely makes video essays, but she also has a long discography of making music. Most of her music falls within the realm of IDM and Electronic Music, but she often delves into experimental music, such as in the post-industrial “Foley Artist.”
In the description for the Bandcamp page for “TECHDOG 1-7,” a full compilation of the whole series, she describes it as an album about her. How she lost the strange and beautiful person she used to be, and the process of trying to find affection for the part of her that she will never get back.
That theme of losing her younger self shines through in the rare times there are lyrics. For example, on Track Six, which is framed as a series of voicemails between her and someone we are not directly told about, it can be assumed she is talking to her younger self. Most of the voicemails are vague, mainly asking when she will be able to call back, but the very last voicemail is her breaking down. During this, she describes how she blamed her younger self for what happened to them, how she wants to feel like herself again, and how she is sorry for abandoning her younger self in hopes to stop bad things from happening to them.
A big draw to the album, at least for me, is the sheer length of the songs. The shortest song is 14 minutes long while the longest is 41 minutes. Along with that, most of these songs contain no lyrics and are very minimal, and yet it still manages to keep my attention for nearly all of that time.
There is also lots of variation within the album, each song invoking many different feelings. For example, Track Seven is a melancholic, sorrow filled track with very few elements that ends with a sudden, intimidating, alien synth. The track after is made up of lots of intimidating, industrial sounds, yet it still feels full of hope and beauty as it builds up to a crescendo at its end.
The first two tracks are mostly silent, so you can skip those if you want to be able to trim it down a little, though I would not recommend it. Like most ambient music, you do not have to put your full focus on it. You could put in on in the background and still get enjoyment out of it, though the last four tracks work best when you put your full focus on them.
Even removed from the context of the other albums in the series, it is still an incredible ambient album, full of beauty and meaning. To me, it is one of the greatest albums of all time, and I am hoping you can find something in it too.
“TECHDOG 7” can be found on Patricia Taxxon’s YouTube channel and her Bandcamp page.