'Pomegranates (2017–2024)' contains the earliest known recordings of Chairs, an Athens, Georgia-based project that was initially comprised of local experimentalists Marcel Sletten, Jackson McLendon, and Oliver Domingo. Currently a six-piece band featuring Sletten, Domingo, and members of Penny Loafer and Racecar 44, you'd be more likely to catch Chairs performing a set of feedback-drenched noise rock nowadays than any of the synth-based dronescapes presented on this compilation. And that's precisely why 'Pomegranates (2017–2024)' is such a special document: since these eight recordings were made, Chairs have moved away from their droney 'n' lo-fi early sound, but this was the intended nature of the project from the very beginning. The band would post very little online beyond show advertisements, members would come and go, and with these seemingly never-ending lineup changes (a form of "musical chairs" even), the sound would mutate and evolve in unpredictable ways.

'Pomegranates' is entirely instrumental; five of the eight tracks were recorded by Sletten alone. McLendon and Domingo appear alongside him on the dronier, more experimental moments such as "Petals," "Celestial Observers," and "Trash Hits," and cuts like "Sunset Dub" and "Smash It Up" reflect Sletten's musical obsessions at the time, which ranged from the deeply influential dub of Keith Hudson to the murky post-punk of Shriekback. The kicker: "Kathmandu" and "At Love Field," both recorded in 2017, were rediscovered last year on a hard drive with attached metadata that referenced Teddy Pendergrass and Michael Mann's 'Heat'.

The fusion of ambient and dub elements across 'Pomegranates' often feels like a wall of sound: something of an early indicator of the densely layered production techniques Sletten and Co. would adopt on subsequent recordings. It all culminates in the chopped and screwed funk of "Smash It Up," one of the last jams Chairs would perform live before the trio would expand and become a fully fledged rock outfit.