Always Inside Your Head

British producer Lone (Matt Cutler) has evoked different sets of influences with each of his albums, but he always crafts colorful, energy-charged interpretations of every genre he attempts. Five years after the jungle/breakbeat hardcore-influenced Levitate, with numerous club-focused singles and archival releases in between, Lone surfaced on the Hot Chip-affiliated Greco-Roman label with Always Inside Your Head, a more song-based effort filled with more ethereal textures than the crisp beats and pastel, bouncy tones hes employed in the past. He hasnt entirely moved away from the hardcore head rush of some of his best work, but here he builds up to more intense sections rather than plunging right in. Opening tune Hidden by Horizons is a shapeshifter featuring Morgane Diets drawn-out vocals and trippy, stop-start breakbeats, resembling a holographic rave in a magical rainforest. The lush, slightly melancholy Realise recalls the early days of trance and ambient techno, with haunting vocals dissolving into mist over wistful keyboard melodies and rolling breaks. Echo Paths is one of a few songs here that venture into trip-hop, and he covers the smooth yet sturdy breakbeats with a thick, soothing wash of seafoam fuzz, as Diet blissfully reminisces with the line It brings me back. While some of the albums tracks are somewhere in the neighborhood of ambient house and the more abstract side of Saint Etienne, Mouth of God is a bit more kinetically charged, with racing beats and acid squiggles accelerating under the philosophical samples and shakuhachi calls. Tree for Tree also follows simmering pulsations, culminating in an acid fanfare. The album concludes on a surprisingly emotional, tear-filled note with the expansive, fluid ambient elegy Coming Into Being and Passing Away. The release is a departure from the ecstatic techno and hardcore that Lones fans might be expecting, but its worth giving a chance, as it explores moods that he previously hadnt touched on, and does so with as much care and fascination as his other albums. Lone always manages to go back in time and see things as they never truly were, and Always Inside Your Head is an immersive venture into the realm of fantasy and magic. ~ Paul Simpson

UKテクノのヴェテランによる5年ぶり8作目はお馴染みのR&Sではなく、心機一転グレコ・ローマンから。いわゆるレフトフィールド系のサウンドを主戦場とする同レーベルに相応しく、いままでの作風とは異なるアプローチで制作。エレクトロニック・ミュージックのさらなる地平を見据えたオープニング曲"Hidden By Horizons"でひとたび幕が上がると、ゆったりとした音楽的創造の領域へと導いてくれる。
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