Dead Air Romance: Steps from the Cliff Summoned Downtempo Darkwave Seduction from Santa Cruz Storm Rituals –

With their ability to make droning electronica feel primally hymnal and set your spine in a deep freeze, Steps from the Cliff are arcane outliers in the sphere of downtempo darkwave electronica. Their latest single, Dead Air Romance, carries all of the seduction you would expect from the title, while any dystopian tints in the production are smoothed over by the non-lexical harmonies that drape soul-sourced accordance across the tableau of downtempo techno, industrial and synthwave.

It resounds like it should be reverberating across the images of a Clive Barker horror film; temptation, melancholy and friction oscillate right past the synths and static-singed beats, giving full emotional range to the monochrome sonic spectre of desire. There is a severe elegance to the way the track moves, allowing its darker textures to feel ritualistic rather than merely atmospheric.

Formed in Santa Cruz during the violent January storms of 2023, Steps from the Cliff began as Tim Knapp’s response to the precarious border between peril and possibility. That origin story bleeds into Dead Air Romance, where coastal unrest, introspection and storm-season ritual are channelled into a release that feels intimately abyssal.

Dead Air Romance is now available to stream on all major platforms, including Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast