The Integratron's Magnetic Fields

Mystical music group UFO 2012 make a pilgrimage to sonic mecca The Integratron in California's Mojave desert to play crystal singing bowls in Jauretsi and Crystal Moselle’s numinous short. Co-founded by professional longboarder Kassia Meador and artist Aska Matsumiya, the band formed out of weekly sessions at Venice Beach surf shop Mollusk, where its seven like-minded members—including models Noot Seear and Kelsey Margerison, music producer and multi-instrumentalist Farmer Dave Scher, fashion photographer David Mushegain, and curator and visual artist Sean Line—gather to play their frequency-based symphonies. “Being in the ocean is so much about surrendering, and I think it’s the same with the crystal bowls,” says Matsumiya. “Like surfing, you have to listen to nature and ride the wave.” They were drawn to the acoustically pristine architecture and healing reputation of the Integratron, a geomagnetic chamber built by aeronautical engineer George Van Tassel in 1954 from a blueprint he says was given to him after being visited by a Venusian spacecraft. “The part about aliens coming down, I was like, ‘okay, we’ll see…’” the filmmakers admit. “But you step into that dome, and I can’t say exactly what it is, but something’s happening in there.” 

Los Angeles gallery OHWOW will release a split 10” EP of UFO 2012’s recordings and Matsumiya’s dreamy electro-pop trio, E.S.P., later this month.