Electronic Recap - January 2020

Artists covered: Bjarki * Bring Me The Horizon * Cale Parks * Georgia * Mura Masa

On the fourth and final recap on the bountiful month in music that was January, at least for some, we dive headfirst into obscurity and frustration with the world of electronic music...

"Psychotic_Window"
Bjarki

6th December 2019

!K7 Records

So...starting off with a pretty obscure and experimental electronic release from Icelandic producer Bjarki, who announced this new album as music he made in a period of time where he was depressed and suffering from insomnia, but where he found himself able to written more music than ever before. He describes this time as his "psychotic window", and as far as an accidental concept album goes it's a pretty fascinating one.

Whilst there is a certain cohesion and sense of placement that songs occupy among the tracklist, each song feels distinct and individual. Much of this album fits what I'd describe as a rainy city aesthetic, and the earlier tracks in particular seem perfect but no less distinctive as a result of this. Another key theme of this album is that of climate change, and it may seem hard to quite comprehend how messages about topics such as this could be conveyed in lyricless, instrumental music but Bjarki proves that it's possible and very potent with songs like "Coil Opinions" fitting both the aforementioned aesthetic and also serving as a musical reflection of some of the chaos inflicted upon our planet. It's a concept I think is really well executed, and it makes perfect sense as an underlying theme that Bjarki would keep coming back to during his psychotic window of time, due to how terrifying climate change can be.

The music that is offered to us is pretty varied in influence, a factor that lends itself incredibly well to the internal and external conflicts that this album portrays. On the one hand, many songs are characterised and driven by their breakbeat rhythms and the quirks of IDM that are heavily incorporated within, whilst other moments are more aggressively techno inspired, although never losing the strangeness and homemade feeling experimentations, particularly when you have certain tracks (such as "Xoxomaa") that rely heavily on their strangeness to cut through the ambience like a knife and keep your attention through the phasing, pulsing background synths. The best moments are when the soundplay devolves into glitchy, broken sounding sounds that morph in and out of being pleasantly odd and fantastically wild.

As you progress through this album it feels increasingly immersive, but it can be easily to lose track and lose patience given the repetitive nature of some songs. "Everyone Is Annoying" sounds like Tosca on steroids and it has one of the simplest, least changing beats which is easy to zone out of but totally worth it if you're giving this album the attention it needs. There's not exactly a bad song on here and most bring enough genuinely fresh instrumentation and manic experimentation to engage me and keep me returning to this album. There is a definite dip in the middle of the album, but once you're out of it Bjarki lets you in on some of his most unique and brilliant material yet.

Psychotic_Window is a captivating, even sometimes mesmerising album, and I'm thrilled that it landed on my radar because it is easily one of the most interesting techno(ish) albums I've heard. I would recommend this to fans of pretty much any electronic music, definitely worth a late night/early morning listen.

8/10

Best Tracks: MIRA; Coil Opinions; Xoxomaa; Psykixk TV; Crybaby; Track 19; Dark Ride; Better Plac4

Worst Tracks: Other Stanky Skyline

"Music to listen to..."
Bring Me The Horizon

27th December 2019

Sony/RCA

Well, Bring Me The Horizon are back already with their latest EP (as they refer to it), although this thing is pretty clearly a mixtape due to the nature of.. well everything about it. After all, what EP is an hour and seventeen minutes long? So... do they up the stakes in terms of experimentation from their last album? Do they continue down the heavier path set by the incredible single "Ludens"?

On their last album amo, the band took their once-metalcore sound in their poppiest direction yet, flirting with trap and EDM as they went and resulting in a strangely modern and experimental release that I enjoyed quite a bit, this new mixtape does something a little different. Many of the primary components and ideas are recycled from amo, right down to some of the lyrics and beats, although the presentation is where things differ. Where amo seamlessly incorporated all those elements into their pop rock and occasionally harder sounds, Music to listen to is more of a full conversion into those electronic and rap influences, although their approach to this style is proving perhaps their most divisive yet. Whilst every new stage of the band's career has been followed by backflash from older fans as the music got progressively poppier, this new mixtape is the largest changeup yet and has the band immersed in an admirably diverse range of styles. The issue comes with their execution.

For the most part, I do find their new direction interesting to listen to as a bold dive into soundscapes I would never have predicted they'd mess around. The problem is that it feels very obviously like they are messing around with these sounds, and the result can be somewhat shallow as they hop on tip toes between styles and subgenres without fully exploring what they could offer. What's more is that the songs themselves are incredibly self indulgent and repetitive, frustratingly overstaying their welcome and failing to deliver enough material of substance to justify me listening to a 10 minute song where nothing much changes or progresses in any way. What's worse is that the beats at the core of it are pretty fantastic and beautifully produced and yet there's not nearly enough focus on where they should be going. Perhaps that's why one of the best tracks is "¿", a song featuring Halsey that interpolates many attributes of the song "In The Dark" from their last album, due to how much more fleshed out it is.

It's not like the songs we get aren't well crafted, just look at the immaculate and orchestral "A Devastating Liberation" or the somewhat trippy hip-hop infused opening track "Steal Something", it's just that in the case of the latter the lyrics are totally meaningless space fillers that waste such a phenomenal beat. Even the brass sections in this one and at the end of the track are great, blissfully complimenting the dark, bassy production whilst the band do nothing over the top of it all. The 24 minute "Underground Big" is probably the worst offender on the whole album, boasting one of the most complete feelings to the first four and a half minutes (which actually function brilliantly as a song) that feature some great bars from rapper Bexey, before we get an out-of-place but admirable 40 seconds of metalcore band Lotus Eater exploding onto the scene out of nowhere and interrupting the status who of Oli Sykes's heavily autotuned and gloriously atmospheric vocals. This is all what I expected from a mixtape from Bring Me, and I wish more of the album could be like this but what do we get for the remaining 19 minutes of the song? One repeating loop and a monologue from Oli that feels extremely improvised and rambly. It's the most pretentious they've got, and it ruins a great song.

Overall, the flaws with this album are pretty concurrent throughout and exemplify just how rushed this thing was. There were some amazing ideas, even some emotional ones, but the same problems take away from the experience of listening to this as the songs are too long, they lack development and the writing is a bit of a non-entity. I can see this being great, and that's easily the worst thing. Still, it's far from bad and I still get lots of enjoyment from the elements that do stick.

6/10

Best Tracks: Steal Something; A Devastating Liberation; ¿; like seeing spiders running riot...; Tapes

Worst Tracks: Underground Big; Dead Dolphins Sounds...

"Boards"
Cale Parks

24th January 2020

Independent

There's something that just feels really good about listening to this EP, whether that's the glistening synths or the gleaming production I don't know but Cale Parks has definitely found and perfected an atmosphere here.

The last two albums were very much made to be relevant pieces of art, for better or for worse, whereas here on Boards the purpose seems to be to achieve the balance between fun and bliss that hits both sweet spots simultaneously without losing your attention or its momentum. It's short, it's cathartic and it's flawlessly presented through the retro sheen of vaporwave-adjacent production that highlights the chilled yet danceable synthwave of the 80s in a very outsider manner that results in some great beats that whilst not differing so much from that of vaporwave somehow only elevate the more ethereal and poppy side of the music in an exclusively positive light.

What I find most amusing is how Cale Parks's previous works in the indie scene with Passion Pit and other bands manages to occasionally shine through in just the right spot to be noticeable, but this album is all the better for it. Where would the title track "Boards" be without its bassline? Possibly even higher in the realms of heaven from all its angelic synths and piano, but I think it's the bassline that tethers it to the ground, in the best possible way. 

Honestly, with this sort of record there's not much to comment on or analyse because it's just so expertly crafted and pleasant to listen to, so I'm going to keep this short and sweet just like the EP and call it what it is: a beautiful, beautiful experience that I hope you won't regret.

8/10

Best Tracks: Late Ape; Boards; SY99; Quiet Storm

Worst Tracks: n/a

"Seeking Thrills"
Georgia

10th January 2020

Domino

This album, for as sonically ambitious and futuristic as it tries to be, lets itself down with overly repetitive, underwritten lyrics that fail to capture more than the surface level concepts it attempts to portray. Still, the music itself is rather fun and buoyant, bobbing up and down between the worlds of synthpop and experimental with just enough of the latter to hold my interest.

I think a big problem that I have is that the concepts of youth, living in the moment, partying and love are framed as very teenagery and coming-of-age based, and Georgia being 30 fails to pull it off convincingly. She doesn't capture those feelings effectively with her writing, despite some excellent instrumentation and synth arrangements that provide an engaging backing that I wish spent more time in the spotlight without her generic, Lauren Mayberry-lite singing. The underwritten and underachieving nature of the lyrics combined with their repetitive nature is especially frustrating, as they are so often nonsensical and literally never unique or distinct.

Another problem I have with this album is how unwilling it is to balance out between the more experimental, dark trap influenced moments with the brighter synthpop and dance passages. On the nocturnal "Mellow" the phrase "mix it up" is repeated, making me wish that Georgia would stir before serving out an album that separates its parts into their blandest, most obvious forms. I want to be surprised and electrified, to be intrigued and involved but I am none of these things. The album is far too safe and structured to give any of these things more than the most surface level treatment.

The walls of synths are beyond epic, but the rhythms are more often than not severely underwhelming and generic. I want to praise "I Can't Wait" but the beat utterly undermines what would have been a possible favourite, a trend that just continuously rears its head and stops me from liking this album as much as I feel like I should. My only consolation is that at least most of the album is (over)clean and underwhelming rather than messy and annoying like with the anthemic, terribly mixed "Feel It". How can an artist go from making a song as beautifully polished as "Started Out" to that? More importantly, why was it included on the album given it came out three years ago and doesn't fit the tone whatsoever; I'm not sure I quite get the motivation to making a lot of these songs but what's worse is when I see the promise and potential the tracks have, something far more frustrating.

It took Georgia five years between her debut and this album, and so the sloppiness and confusions in direction are frustrating but also make too much sense, given the overproduced atmosphere is exactly what I'd expect from something with so much time spent working towards it. Seeking Thrills is Georgia dipping her toes in two buckets of water, one pop and one more futuristic, and I sincerely hope that on her next release she submerges herself both buckets and finds better ways to combine them.
4/10
Best Tracks: Started Out; The Thrill; Honey Dripping Sky
Worst Tracks: Mellow; Till I Own It; Feel It; Ray Guns


"R.Y.C"
Mura Masa
31st January 2020
Polydor

Following some truly lightning singles, it kind of feels like there's not much else that this album really offers. Sure, it's definitely a step up from Mura Masa's last album's confused muddle of hip-hop, electronica and indie, particularly due to the rougher, punkish edge to the songs this time around that help to elevate the claustrophobic production that sometimes seems to forget that space is an incredibly effective tool when arranging music.

I'll give Mura Masa a lot of credit in theory due to his combination of intricate rhythms, unconventional background sounds and spiky guitars that give a lot of character to his music. In reality, it often suffers from unflattering production and this time around it's overloaded with frustrating, half baked interludes and moments of fumbling filler make this short album feel far from streamlined. I suppose there's still a lot to love and one relief is that the best moments are spread apart which does mean that for as mediocre or overcrowded as much of the album is there's not too much drag or boredom when listening front to back even with a substantial amount of tracks failing to impress me with the quality that shines through on the highlights.

I do tend to gravitate towards the more raw, punk-infused tracks on here for the more bombastic and weighted sounds that they provide without the baggage of too many layers or a somewhat confused mix that a song like "I Don't Think We Can Do This Again" has (although it still made it onto my year end list for how much energy the instrumental and passion in Clairo's vocals the song had). On the topic of energy, a pretty unignorable track has to be the Slowthai featuring "Deal Wiv It", an explosive song that shows off the best of both artists involved without Slowthai even really rapping all that much (instead he amusingly shouts the majority of lyrics). On the other hand, the least energetic non-interlude has to come from the intended centrepiece "In My Mind" which I wish said more and did more with its great drums but ultimately overly repetitive and annoying synth section.

I didn't expect Mura Masa's own singing to feature prominently through this album given the singles but in fact he takes the lead on a fair few songs, which is neither a particularly great thing or a bad one. His vocals are at their best when paired with a similarly rawer instrumental like on the bombastic "vicarious living anthem", and they're at their worst when they're too processed as on the aforementioned "In My Mind", as well as on the extremely minimal "a meeting at an oak tree". In fact, one of the best vocal performances comes from Georgia on the funky "Live Like We're Dancing", a track that encapsulates so much of the youthful energy she attempted on her own album to a far better degree. It doesn't quite take the cake though, as my personal favourite feature has to go to Ellie Roswell of Wolf Alice on "Teenage Headache Dreams", a truly immersive and transcendent experience and possibly the best song on R.Y.C.

Conclusively, this is pretty alright. It may suffer from some definite filler and a lot of the same problems that stunted the excellence of his first album, but its punk edge and good selection of features help this to be an exciting new step for Mura Masa that leaves me anticipating what he'll do next. It's flawed, but its exploration of themes is surprisingly successful and this does feel very complete despite everything. It very much is the raw youth collage it was meant to be.
6.5/10
Best Tracks: No Hope Generation; I Don't Think I Can Do This Again; Deal Wiv It; vicarious living anthem; Teenage Headache Dreams
Worst Tracks: Today; a meeting at an oak tree



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Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed this first Electronic Recap. If you did then don't you worry because more recaps will be coming next month, and before that a brand new thinkpiece.


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