Katarina Gryvul: “Ocean” Track Review

In late 2020, when the Kyiv club known simply as ∄ launched its in-house record label Standard Deviation, the Ukrainian capital was home to one of the world’s most celebrated club scenes. Today, living in the shadow of Russia’s war on the country, it has evolved. Despite an 11 p.m. curfew this summer, some revelers were making time for dancing during daylight hours; others—such as the ravers-turned-activists of the volunteer organization Repair Together—were reorganizing cleanup and rebuilding projects in villages that had come under Russian shelling. 

Celebrating ∄’s third anniversary, From Ukraine, For Ukraine is Standard Deviation’s first release in nine months; the 20-track compilation brings together international artists like Detroit’s DJ Stingray and the Shanghai/Taipei producer Tzusing with Ukrainian fixtures like Katarina Gryvul. Much like her February 2022 album Tysha—the last thing the label put out before the invasion—her song “Ocean” feels torn between stately and disruptive moods. Her choral harmonies have a liturgical air, yet they are run through digital processing so fierce that it practically shreds them. An underlying bed of string synths conveys a neo-classical grandeur that’s battered by bruising metallic rumbling, like a chamber ensemble soldiering on inside the buckling hull of a damaged submarine. It’s the sort of gothic ambient pop you might have expected to find on 4AD in 1985—think Cocteau Twins or This Mortal Coil—updated with 21st-century sound design and hard-earned pathos.