Distraxi - Styx Anaesthetist (V59)

Alina Church returns her Distraxi project to Venalism with one of her most compositionally diverse, profoundly personal and engaging releases to date. ’Styx Anaesthetist’ was created while Alina was in recovery after facial feminisation surgery and the release acts as a documentation and reflection of her experience and convalescence. The result is a work that takes Distraxi into fascinating new territory.

‘Styx..’ finds Distraxi foregrounding expansive atmospherics and uneasy restraint much more than before. These elements have been present previously but rather than acting as divergencies between aural assaults, on ‘Styx…’ they act as the fulcrum to the work. But don’t assume that these exercises into subtler textures reflects an easier listen, if anything it instead communicates it’s heightened tension and disquiet with a more adept, fine-tuned nuance.

Through these methods Distraxi conveys the existential anxiety of invasive medical procedures, the off-kilter, murky tranquility of enforced sedation and the tentative, cautious belief that this process will bring closer into focus the reality of autonomy of mind and body.

‘Styx…’ is a release of incredible significance both musically and conceptually, it’s the sound of an artist flexing their creative capability and testing the parameters of their previous work with an hitherto unheard assurance, whilst presenting herself at her most contemplative, poised and explicative.

Cello on 'Submit Becoming' - Modcine
Guitar on 'Pluto's Table' - Hannah Bannanah

Mastered by Foul Prey: www.instagram.com/foulprey/

Released May 28th 2026. Venalism V59