Public Memory

The dreamy electronic project of Robert Toher, Public Memory's dense collages of dub, Krautrock and trip-hop explore loss, dreams and shared nostalgia. On albums such as 2018's Demolition, Toher uses little more than otherworldly vocals, a Korg synthesizer, guitar and field recordings to craft hallucinatory tracks that sound like they could evaporate at any moment, yet leave a lasting impact.
After spending much of the '90s in punk bands, Toher found some success with the post-rock group Apse, which released a pair of albums (2006's Spirit and 2009's Climb Up) before disbanding in 2011. Toher and his former Apse bandmate Austin Stawiarz then founded ERAAS, a project that added pulsing electronics to the atmospheres of their previous band on 2012's self-titled debut and the following year's Initiation. After that album's release, ERAAS called it quits; around that time, Toher also ended a relationship, so he moved to Los Angeles to work on a set of songs that became the first Public Memory album. Wuthering Drum, which stripped Toher's arrangments down to a Korg MS-20 Mini, guitar and field recordings, arrived in early 2016 on Felte Records. The Veil of Counsel EP followed in 2017 and boasted a slightly clearer sound that Toher expanded on with Public Memory's 2018 album Demolition. ~ Heather Phares