Los Angeles - Flying Lotus

Los Angeles

Flying Lotus [Warp]

#10 in this month's The 20

• Section: Music Recommendations Topics: The 20
• Written by: Terry Church

From the 55-second introductory track ‘Auntie’s Harp’, Flying Lotus’ new album ‘Los Angeles’ is impressively mosaic.

By combining warm, organic tones with live instruments, gorgeous blissful vocals, and blitzkrieg glitchy breakbeat Flying Lotus have managed to craft an enticing album of pop-centric electronica that isn’t afraid of warm melodies.

Too often electronica albums hide behind the machines that were used to create them, and quite frankly, they sometimes get a little dull and a little too far up their own ass.

Of course, there is no dark without light, and ‘Los Angeles’ basks in the warmth of its summer grooves.

‘Auntie’s Lock/Infinitum’, featuring the vocals of Laura Darlington, inspires images of a hammock gently rocking in the breeze under a coconut tree so delicate is its female vocal.

‘Beginners Falafel’ and ‘Breathe. Something/Stellar Star’ travel along lazily on a wave of broken drum loops and distorted breakbeat as serene pads and ethereal chords glide through the haze of technology.

There’s 1980s-inspired electro funk to be found on ‘GNG BNG’ that could form the backdrop to a particularly memorable hip hop track, had Flying Lotus been brave enough to flirt with rap.

The African drumming on ‘Melt!’ combines with splintering FX and trainwrecking synth loops to create a sound that could have come from an impromptu jam session in a jungle village.

There’s plenty of space-age sound effects too.

The highlight of ‘Los Angeles’ however, is in the vocal-led chill out grooves of ‘RobertaFlack’, ‘Testament’ and ‘Auntie’s Lock/Infinitum’.

It is through these three tracks that Flying Lotus display real pop potential, and as such have managed to distance themselves for the sometimes prosaic nature of Warp albums.

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