A wide-reaching EP with some glorious high points and a journey that goes sonically all over the shop. Each piece feels like it has a narrative to exploit and each does this with great elan. Fine, refined work.
EPs
Maxime fuses an organic folk sound with a mildly theatrical performance style for this EP, paying tribute to effective and raw musicality as much as his family background in theatre.
In terms of genre, New Realms (that title is probably a clue!) is borrowing from all over the place. As well as the influences I’ve already mentioned, there is something of Ulrich Schnauss-era Engineers about the overall effect of the EP. It’s rich, imaginative, compelling and intriguing. It’s hard to imagine higher praise than this.
It’s a pleasure to hear music like this make a come back, it feels perfectly well suited to some reflective moment of cinema or TV drama, and yet it works equally well as the comforting embrace music fans often need on the long drive home.
A pristine and professional soundscape creates a trip-hop-like ambiance, a peaceful moment of escapism. Alongside this you get Kenni’s seemingly free-style vocal melody, meandering through the layers, offering personal insight & contemporary references that often feel well-rooted in modern hip hop.
This is something like Americana with a rock edge, a layer of synths, superb story-telling, and a near-gospel style performance – not to mention a hearty hit of big-band, piano-led country swing to see things out
They write from a place of depth, and they craft their songs based on those intentions & feelings – they don’t sit down & say ‘let’s write a country song, let’s write something blues-rock’, the concept & the moment comes first, which gives them purpose, and a quickly unique vibe that runs throughout these four songs.
A lot of reviewing is predicated upon making comparisons between the subject and other acts that the readership might know, but with The Lost Millions, this is more of a challenge than usual, and that’s a real feather in their cap.
Roundabout is an EP that has been pristinely crafted and expertly boxed up; ready to gift you a nostalgic and soul-soothing walk through the jazz-soaked streets of yesteryear.
Into The Fall allows, for many, the mind to feel a soulful human presence purely through melody, musicality, and mysterious poetry.
Tar-ris’s use of breath as a percussion element and bird sounds in the chorus, coupled with the piano loops, creates a cinematic undertone that ultimately adds to the overarching drama of the music.
BICHAI is self-described as an electronic lounge artist, which might imply that a listening experience is an indoor one. But if you close your eyes and listen, the scope of the vision and the depth of the sonic choice makes it a far wider one.