Lemniscate

Saying that there's a slew of people in the 2010s who really like their home recording setups, electronic production with a vaguely retro feel (that inevitably ends up sounding like the current moments) and a general appreciation of cryptic murk and pop hooks in equal measure is putting it mildly. So Vinyl Williams's Lemniscate seems pretty much tailor made for a certain kind of crowd and listener in whatever indie has become during that time, whether one has ODed on Animal Collective, Ariel Pink or Active Child. Lionel Williams himself tends more towards the half-sung/half-spoken/all-reticent in terms of vocal delivery, though at least there's an attempt to vary things up from the start, with the opening whooshes of "Tokyo -> Sumatra" leading towards the quicker pulses and bass on "Higher Worlds." Still, this is an album you can pretty quickly draw a bead on, and not positively -- it's not that there's no appeal at all Lemniscate, given moments like the skittering flow of "Who Are You," matched by one of Williams' stronger if still quietly dreamy vocals. It's just that there's nothing really individual to seize on here, and that the overall understatedness of things, even at the arrangements' fullest, means that any description of this with a shrug and "Eh, chillwave" is all too apt. Add to that the kind of songtitles that seem to suggest something between Omni magazine and New Age seminars -- "Stellarscope," "Follow In Your Dreams," "Inner Space" -- and the result's a series of overly familiar moves more than anything else. ~ Ned Raggett|

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bounce (C)武田晃