Alex Zhang Hungtai, a Taiwanese-born Canadian lo-fi musician based in Lisbon,Portugal created the project Dirty Beaches in 2005. Like Bo Diddley or minimalist synth provocateurs Suicide, Dirty Beaches’ compositions were not so much stripped down as refined to their essence. Drum loops, Hungtai’s croon, and the yearning melodies draped overtop belie as much a sense of haunting mystery as they do romanticism and wry humour. In November 2014 Alex Zhang Hungtai announced the end of Dirty Beaches.