Oblique is back with another album.

The Fort Wayne electronic artist will release You’ll Know It When It Happens on Sept. 1, and he says it’s quite a bit different than his 2018 debut, Last Call.

“Last Call was my senior project at Saint Francis, so there were a lot of different things that contributed to that at the time,” said Mark Waldick, the man behind Oblique. “It was still early on when I was learning how to write music and, also, I had a three-month time constraint. There were a lot of things rushed. With the new project, I had all the time in the world.”

Keeping things more instrumental

Along with producing his own music, Waldick works with hip-hop artists and actually released Beat Tape, Vol. I in 2019. On Last Call, he incorporated vocals from some of his University of Saint Francis classmates: Neras, Ellie Parker, and Haley Sorg.

While there are some vocals on You’ll Know It When It Happens, the majority is all him.

“It’s very different than Last Call, which had a lot of vocal features,” Waldick said. “I wanted to show off more of my production skills, so I kept a lot of it instrumental.”

The are three tracks with prevalent vocals, with Nathalie Q on “Not Again,” Astronun on “Castaways,” and Slova on “Didn’t Let This In.” Elsewhere, he samples selections from Last Call, with Sorg’s voice popping up on “Something New,” “Castaways,” and “Pull Me In.”

A darker Sound and Aesthetic

When it comes to production, Waldick says this album has a darker feel to it. The cover art adds to the aesthetic of the album, shot by Fallan Mauz of Black Siren Productions and Grant Huffman.

“I’d say some of the noises and sound choices, especially the percussion, it’s a lot harsher,” Waldick said. “I wouldn’t say it’s very bright sounding, which I hoped to visually show with everything being black and white.

“It’s a lot more polished and consistent,” he added. “I feel like, compared to Last Call, I’m very happy with the flow of it throughout. I think it has a good flow through the track list. And it’s more abrasive, sort of how my last single was. It’s also got a few samples in it. I sampled some from Last Call, which I just love to do.”

That last single was “188,” which was released on Nov. 11. That song led Waldick to continue to follow that sound, resulting in You’ll Know It When It Happens.

“I started this back in December, shortly after my single ‘188’ dropped,” Waldick said of the album. “I started working on a couple of other things that were inspired by working on that. I had three of the tracks from (You’ll Know It When It Happens) started at the same time, and I was like, ‘OK, I feel the momentum of this.’ Most of the production was done between January and March, then it was a lot of fine-tuning after that.”

That fine-tuning has led to a complex sound, which you can hear now with the first single off the album, “Do U,” currently on streaming services. Categorized as “Dance,” the single is one of the most upbeat on the album.

“A lot of the songs aren’t danceable, per se. I’m OK with that,” Waldick said. “I’ve had a few chances to play chunks of it live and the reactions have been pretty good. 

“I already have ideas for my next big project. I would like it to be the same production style, but more dance-focused so it can be played as ‘club music.’”

You will have a chance to decide if the music is danceable when he joins a stacked lineup for NUA Block Party Round II at The Ruin on Friday, Sept. 8.