Albums ‘Any Other Way’ is the perfect opening to such confusion, weaving the vocal fragility of label-mates Big Thief and the worldly sincerity of someone double her age. As you hear every guitar string strung, the refrain of “I didn’t know any other way” takes on a candor that guides Tomberlin through the introspective vulnerabilities that follow. ‘Tornado’ is a beautiful hunt for self-definition (“I am a tornado with big green eyes and a heartbeat”) while ‘You Are Here’ offers that self-definition back into someone else’s hands (“I’m trying to give you everything you want and I’m trying to be everything you want.”). Written as a means of getting through one stage of life to the next, for all the maturity ‘At Weddings’ offers lyrically there’s little change of instrumental pace on the record. Growing up is tumultuous, but each track here exists within the same reserved dimension. But, as Tomberlin fights the fondness of nostalgia, treating the album with the patience it requires might leave you realising just what an impressive introduction it is. 7/10 Tristan Gatward
WEN — EPHEM:ERA (big dada) One suspects that leaps in technology have been causing the old guard to accuse the young of weakening attention spans since at least the time of Gutenberg’s early printing press demos, but Ramsgate producer Owen Darby, aka WEN, is not so quick to pass judgement. His second album is a study in whether our flitting, scattershot modern habits may themselves in fact hold an elemental beauty. This 12-track, 38-minute record, as its title suggests, is designed to say something about our pace of life. A pick’n’mix of assorted, attention-proof instrumental grime nuggets that Darby
himself describes as “temporal pauses”, it is both a mutated musical incarnation of our eternal restlessness and a cry to resist the self-refilling intravenous drip of twitter feeds and targeted ads that keeps us treadmilling along. Darby has invoked another great diver into the psychology of time, the Venetian architect Carlo Scarpa, as an influence here, but ‘EPHEM:ERA’ is more inclined towards the darkness. The tracks are brief samples of moods rather than full explorations: the zipping, spectral house of mirrors of ‘Curve:Relay’, the grime-house template of ‘Time II Think’ and the Hyperdub-esque urban milieu of ‘Rain’ are so different in mood that they could all spawn wildly different offspring albums of their own. As an exercise in concision, then, ‘EPHEM:ERA’ is an enticing if occasionally frustrating listen. As a reflection of our changing listening habits, it hits scarily close to home. 6/10 Max Pilley
Gaika — Basic Volume (warp) Gaika’s full-length Warp debut opens with a minute of sour and amorphous electronics. It’s a confidently patient beginning for an artist who knows how to write an instant hook. But Gaika would rather set the mood, emphasise the scale. ‘Basic Volume’ is near an hour long, every moment soaked in this tension and ghostly ambience. His futuristic dancehall has always kept the melodies simple and sharp, and the production icy and epic. The swirling darkness is so consistent that an hour of material could turn into a pile of gloomy sludge in the hands of a lesser artist, but Gaika flourishes when fleshing out his ideas. Vocally, he constantly shifts his energy, from mournful vocoder-backed crooning to barked staccato raps and
eerie spoken word. On ‘Grip’ he digs deep into his lower register for commanding deadpan verses. Two songs later, he’s clear and sweet over a rubbery SOPHIE co-produced instrumental. ‘Ruby’ is perhaps his most powerful vocal performance, a fractured and layered piece built on elegant vocal runs that flow over each other, like an even bleaker, bolder take on the experiments James Blake crafted on his debut. The production is just as nimble, despite its overarching cohesiveness. You could play ‘Crown and Key’ just listening to the kick drums and have an exciting time, and that’s before talking about the incredible build and snarling delivery. All of this meticulousness isn’t without purpose. ‘Basic Volume’ is a haunting picture of rebellion and black existence. Gaika circles around images of violence, spiritualism and black bodies. “Naked and black in a white man’s world,” he says at the end of the opening track, after describing the chaos of inner city life. His lyrics sound even starker under his gothic, weighty production. There’s a host of artists from Travis Scott to Young Fathers who wish to depict the pain, beauty and heft of these topics, and Gaika’s attempts at points may feel eerily like how these topics have already been explored, but it’s in the constant production twists and cracked melodies that Gaika begins to stand out. They’re the features that make ‘Black Empire (Killmonger Anthem)’ so exhilarating, and ‘Born Thieves’ so achingly sad. Over the next few months the scope of Gaika’s debut will only expand, as listeners dive into its rich pool of sounds. 8/10 Stephen Butchard
Cullen Omori — The Diet (sub pop) It’s been a tumultuous time for Cullen Omori between the release of his debut solo album
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