“Nice EDM which goes by with harmony and without constraints”
1 Myopium 5:47
2 Honeychrome 6:04
3 Crystal Brain 8:06
4 Silent Lake 6:45
5 Starseed 7:28
6 Implanetary 6:10
7 Morphing 5:45
8 Summerender 7:19
(CD-R/DDL 53:27) (V.F.)
(EDM, Chillout)
Those who miss the electronic music (EM) of Tangerine Dream, in its more contemporary phase, should lend an ear to Lightform's career. This project of Tim Darbyshire sticks album after album a good and well-structured EM; genre, intro, chorus, verse and finale. A challenge worth mentioning, especially when you think that he is the only one to compose the music. Except that BUENO is rather different. Favoring a more electronic dance music (EDM) than his usual electronic rock, the Canadian musician offers an album based on chillout with a touch of synth-pop in its harmonious tunes. Available on CD-R as well as on download, this new album offers 8 tracks, all as seductive as each other, which go by with harmony and without the constraints of a more progressive music. We are far from Circadian Rhythms, released at the very beginning of the year. But it is simple, melodious and catchy!
This new album starts under the sign of a chillout with Myopium. It's on a cosmic snow and arrangements in staccato that the title invites an arpeggio to jump in a melodious axis. Early on, electronic percussions firm up the structure into a light electronic rock that other chords, running nervously over the keyboard, redirect into a kind of chillout that is topped with a tasty bass layer. After a honeyed introduction, Honeychrome offers a nice melodic structure that is set to a metronomic rhythm that is more driving than passive. In fact, the flow is rigged by the movement of the sequencer, which wants to inject harmonic depth periodically by scrolling lines as vivid as the threads of a mirror-covered stream. Crystal Brain also benefits from a bright opening with sonic prisms shining on a cascading chord drop. The beat doesn't really waver on its direction taking the form of good electronic dance music (EDM) that the bass makes suggestive. We can hear some vocal riffs once belonging to the repertoire of Tangerine Dream. In the end, Tim Darbyshire proposes a good soft techno with reverb effects of the sequencer on a structure having its affinities with a good Moonbooter. The reflections of shimmering sequencers are also favored by Silent Lake which is another very musical chillout, and maybe a little more ambient, with nice harmonies points on a bidirectional rhythm structure. It's winter in BUENO as snowfalls appear quite often with those shimmering lines falling slaloming from the skies. And this is the main setting of the very good Starseed which is a cross between a smoothly undulating rhythm and another more jerky rhythm line. The duel takes place under a good mist and a discreet layer of celestial voices. After this title, which gave me the taste to hear Software, Implanetary is the jewel of this new Lightform album by screwing us an excellent New Berlin School at the limits of EDM. It proposes a lively movement of the sequencer annexed to the sober percussions of an anemic Techno and exploits a rhythm in constant movement, with seductive percussive effects, that renews its melodic sources. We change register with Morphing which proposes a kind of hip-hop jumping and blustering on a cosmic highway. It's like running in slow motion in our dreams where we try to escape death with good elastic effects in the rhythm. Summerender ends this new chapter in Lightform's career with a chillout set on fire in a cosmic vision. As I wrote above; beautiful, simple and catchy.
Sylvain Lupari (November 26th, 2021) *****
Available at Lightform Bandcamp