Youngsbower / Relayer

Vhf

The second collaboration between these two stalwart titans of the true UK underground comes eight years after their first pairing on the Site/Realm LP. The title no doubt a nod to the odd resemblance of seven-year-old Rosalie Bower's cover art to another LP of the same title, this Relayer throws out the live methodology of the earlier LP for a dense set of layered studio recordings. Like the music of Matthew Bower's Sunroof! group, the tracks are rainbows of colors and textures with string drone, percussion, bleeps, and the unidentifiable, competing in a mix devoid of the traditional "lead with backing" schema. Many tracks have the kind of welcoming electronic bed seldom heard since the demise of Harmonia, with ring-modulated fuzz bleeping away over a chugging, but non-oppressive beat. Elsewhere, there's Richard Youngs' Riley-style organ ping-pong, a little virtuoso Kalimba, thick wads of analog synth... you know where this is going. So tightly edited and accessible that this would be the perfect summer top-down CD, but what with it being released in November, you'll have to keep it safe until the thaw. Or cruise Australia for Thanksgiving.   Ten tracks, 48 minutes, the second collaboration full-length from two of VHF's most prolific Little more unidentifiable in the monitor, please? Crossfile in Sunroof, Youngs/Wickham-Smith, Total, and Skullflower sections-- go on we dare you   

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