Nosaj Thing - Drift

i've been hearing about this for the better part of a year now, so when i heard that a remix album was coming out (it was released yesterday), i figured it was time to see what Nosaj Thing was all about. as the saying goes, "better late than never."

my expectation were high for three of reasons. for one, Nosaj Thing (24-year-old Jason Chung) is loosely tied to Flying Lotus and he rest of the L.A. glitch-hop scene. second, the album came out on Alpha Pup, the Daddy Kev run label that rarely puts out anything short of great. finally, he's been receiving accolades from the likes of BBC, as an artist to watch because of his first place finish in L.A.'s prestigious Project Blowed beat battle. as much as i try not to buy into hype, i couldn't help it this time.

regardless, this album far exceeded my expectations. Chung is a skilled producer. where Flying Lotus' music is a dense hodge-podge of samples competing for space, Chung's is spacey and ambient. there's a lot going on, but it doesn't feel crowded. Drift sounds more like what's happening with London's dubstep scene, than what his laptop wielding L.A. peers are doing. his main tie to glitch-hop is his belief that drum sounds can come from everywhere. besides the obvious handclap, there's the ripping of duct tape and jingle of pocket change ("1685/Bach"), and water leaking onto various surfaces ("IOIO").

the overall sound is that of music being made in a murky cellar, spacious and echoing, filled with drippy synth lines. that isn't to say it's in any way dreary or depressing. no, this is a celebration of the fun that can be had in dark, dank spaces.  the only low spots come when he drops his dark minor chord facade in exchange for a cheerier one on "2222," and on "Lords," an otherwise brilliant track made less brilliant by the inclusion of human voices. they're brief hiccups, and i use the word "low" loosely, as everything on here is fairly exceptional.

enjoy

Nosaj Thing - IOIO
Nosaj Thing - 1685/Bach
Nosaj Thing - Caves

Flying Lotus - Pattern + Grid World

Steven Ellison (a.k.a. Flying Lotus) is a busy fella. his third full length, Cosmogramma, hit shelves in May. it's a challenging record that incorporates his usual video game beats while straddling the line between hip-hop and avant-garde jazz. a risky dichotomy to bring together, but the risk paid off, and the end result will likely end up on several top ten lists this year. Cosmogramma is dense and, at first listen, messy, but with multiple listens you begin to scratch the surface and the broader picture comes into view.

the jazz element shouldn't surprise us too much, by the way; Ellison is the nephew of the late jazz pianist, harpist, and vocalist Alice Coltrane.

but i digress. Cosmogramma is Ellison swinging for the fences, an effort after which most artists would sit back and chill. somehow, in the time when he's not remixing songs or running his Brainfeeder label, he's managed to produce more music. a mere four months later we have Pattern + Grid World, his newest EP, proof that FlyLo is not most artists. brevity is the only EP thing about it. despite being barely 19 minutes long, it feels like a full length album, partially due to Ellison's ability to pack a lot of sound into a small space, but mainly because he truly is an album artist.

not one to sit in one place too long, Ellison seems to have already forgotten his jazzy new approach, leaning this time on angular beats, squelching synths, and obscure samples. "Jurassic Notion/M Theory," as the name suggests, is FlyLo at his most primitive, an ancient tribe celebrating a successful hunt. on the other hand, "Physics for Everyone!" is the music of a hadron collider.

despite it's grandeur, Cosmogramma isn't an ideal place for first time FlyLo listeners to start. it's long and, honestly, a bit tedious. i'm not saying it's not a great album, but i recommend this EP as an introduction piece.




enjoy

Flying Lotus - Pieface
Flying Lotus - Jurassic Notion/M Theory
Flying Lotus - Physics for Everyone!