From the Brooklyn outfit who once collaborated with 405 favourites, This Will Destroy You, comes a series of sometimes intriguing tracks in the form of Shutter Release. Lymbyc Systym, with their compositions that drift sometimes from tranquil and clean, to cosmic and climactic, are achieving a combination of what their contemporaries, Blue States and DMST (Do Make Say Think) did with First Steps Into... and & Yet & Yet. At its peak we hear seemingly endless overlapping, droning feedback that makes up the percussion, while a lead instrument plays a simple melody that can keep us engaged.
At other times however, it's all too easy to drift off from these sounds, which fail to refine and progress as the record develops. After I've finished puzzling over what time my lecture is tomorrow, I return to listening to the album and fail to tell how many tracks have gone by. Encouraging a short attention span is not a good sign in a piece of work. The positive response that it does influence (in anyone who isn't too lazy) is to go back and listen once again, to catch what you've missed and get as much out of it as you can.
Some people may see this as a rather poor element in album and it certainly may not be the artist's intention. Who would want to be bored and distracted at times, instead of being hooked all the way through? It's actually a great learning experience in music appreciation to someone who wants to keep giving it a chance; While the track, 'Bedroom Anthem', comes across at first as nothing more than a DMST song with more powerful drums and brass, continuously revisiting it reveals its properties, more true to Lymbyc Systym, such as the incredible subtle changes in atmospheric movements in the percussion. Just as important, the most powerful songs like the opening 'Trichromatic', stand out even further.
It's an album that you may want to dismiss as background music, but Lymbyc Systym have gone through intelligent processes and reached good results with Shutter Release. It is difficult to appreciate it all at once, but merits attention. - The 405 |
