Back in March 2016, I wrote a Slog post about Seattle synth magus Norm Chambers (formerly known as Panabrite) composing the soundtrack to Graphic Means, a documentary about the history of pre-internet (ca. 1950s-1990s) graphic design production by Portland director Briar Levit. More than a year-and-a-half later, you can finally hear the music via Chambers's Bandcamp. It's worth the wait, whether you saw the movie or not.

With a punctiliousness common to graphic design itself, Graphic Means' score conveys a minimalist calm and burbling industriousness, sounding not unlike the German duo Cluster circa the percolating pastoralisms of Sowiesoso/Zuckerzeit, Conrad Schnitzler at his calmest, and Nobukazu Takemura during his late-'90s IDM heyday. The album also contains some of Chambers's most grandiloquent work, especially "Index" and "Runner," kosmische excursions that launch you way out of graphic design's office-bound world and into deep space.

Graphic Means stands out as one of Chambers's most ambitious creations in a prolific career dating back to 2010. Now to view the film...