This is Yppah’s fouth album. It’s being reviewed here today because Janet Jackson won’t let us listen to her album yet. theartsdesk heard yesterday that it’s still under wraps, fearful of piracy. This is a regular occurrence, especially with big US stars. It is also fortuitous because Yppah makes the sort of delicious off-radar music that deserves wider exposure. In the Autumn, when so many big names are releasing music, he and multitudes boasting a similarly low profile are shunted aside so you can read about the usual deluge of glossy everyday normalcy.
Yppah, on the other hand, a guy called Joe Corrales Jr from Texas who has recently moved to California, doesn’t major in vocal songs, he’s more into woozy instrumentals. Back in the days when groups such as Röyksopp, Air and Orbital were major news, he might even have mustered more attention, but not now. This is a shame as his music is gorgeous. Riding bubbling breakbeats and funky drums, it’s a floatation tank of flitting bell melodies, half-heard vocals and cuddly basslines. It feels blissed out and it makes me happy. It’s sunnier than his last couple of albums, lighter, but not dramatically different in tone. There’s less of the heavy psychedelic shoegaze guitars, although they’re still in there, toned down, a vital ingredient adding jangling psychedelic sweetness.
Highlights include “Little Dreamer”, which recalls the rustic beauty of Nathan Fake’s outstanding 2006 album Drowning in a Sea of Love, albeit tinted with a hint of Slowdive, and “Bushmills”, which has something of the Stone Roses' ecstasy euphoria about it, but filtered through a plethora of smeared effects units. Best of all, however, is “Owl Beach II”. Built round a plaintive guitar motif it blossoms into something so lush and lovely, it makes the spine tingle. This is music to unobtrusively fill a room with joy. Thank you, Janet Jackson, for the opportunity to share it.
Overleaf: Listen to "Bushmills"
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