In the early afternoon sun of Melbourne’s second true spring day, Sampology's new record plays out like ideal holding pattern music.
It takes cues from those most traditionally summery producers, your Kaytranadas, your Medasins, throwing in elements of something you might associate with Hiatus Kaiyote. It’s a product of these disparate influences and still its own thing.
The album’s real triumph is using those familiarities almost to lull you into an ambitious project whose successes are in the quieter moments when it becomes all-encompassing.
He’s an artist whose achievements are in the loosely described genre of ‘house’, and on songs like ‘Running Around’ it becomes clear that there’s still space for more traditional, looping tracks built around a single theme without them feeling out of place.
It’s a matter of balance. For every song with a bright burst of feature vocals- ‘Blooming in the Streets’ stands out, as does ‘Saturn Returns’- there’s one that makes itself out of ostensibly less elements, the end result being a sequence of tracks that leads to a mellowing experience that doesn’t go either way.
For example, the way that the housier and aforementioned ‘Running Around’ beco’mes ‘Sand County Almanac’, becomes ‘Reassemble’ is just altogether very relaxing.
Maybe the album’s ultimate standout, at least as much as it stands different to the rest, is the closer and title track. It’s darker, bassier, but there’s an uplifting woodwind that feels like something to grab on to. Not light at the end of the tunnel so much as, maybe, something that channels the idea of growing differently.
Ah. Maybe the whole thing is spring. Maybe it’s a timed release as we collectively round into Spring because that’s the regrowth? It’s certainly a project that inspires a lot of maybes, or that collective thought that leads to them. Something worth looking over and ruminating about.
Sampology’s ‘Regrowth’ is available everywhere from Wednesday September 3, stream it here.
