Niagara
– Hyperocean (Monotreme Records)
LP
/ CD / DL
Out
now
8.75
/ 10
Italian
experimental electro popsters return with their new album.
David
Tomat and Gabriele Ottino present their third album in the form of the
enthralling Hyperocean – an album of experimental pop and beefy percussion that
draws comparisons to the Chemical Brothers on occasion.
With
water as a theme, Hyperocean mixes hard-hitting bass and crunching drum sounds
with often out-of-synch melodies and intermittent voices. It’s all staggering stuff as it splutters and
pounds through its consistent elven tracks.
The
title track is stormer of an (almost) instrumental which carries the subject of
h20 throughout. Described as ‘a planet
like Earth but completely covered by water’ and ‘the future Atlantis’ it uses
sounds of water in either beats or rhythms as a common link which blends
everything together wonderfully.
Escher
Surfers even contains vocals which sound as though they were recorded
underwater as they burble and gurgle against a backdrop of poppy dance and
movement. There’s the inclusion of a
track called Blackpool which has melodies slipping and sliding sometimes incoherently
but beautifully with repetitive voices and delicate hook lines. The comically titled Roger Water also slows
the pace as it enters Drift, a track which hypnotises and soothes.
Psychedelia
and funk elements also feature, as the duo strive to make an album that has
innumerable angles from which to enjoy it’s many perspectives. Often incorporating a neo-ambient streak,
Hyperocean can be spellbinding and magnetic at all times.
Solar
Valley sounds almost alien-like and also contains some party Whoops and Woo’s
as it zips between stereo speakers almost making the listener dizzy, with
robotic voices that surprise and regale.
An overused vocoder could possibly have been avoided but it’s a
desperate criticism on an album which is far from dull.
The
album ends with the shimmering Alfa 11, an eleven-and-a-half-minute opus which beautifully
closes a highly entertaining album as it slowly rises and rises with zipping
bass and effervescent tones to a climactic finale.
Links
Monotreme Records
Niagara website
Niagara on Twitter
Niagara on Facebook
Published on Louder Than War 10/05/16 - here
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