- Washing over you in relentlessly gentle waves, it's the pads that will probably stay with you long after you've finished listening to Joe McBride's Broken Promises EP. The title track slowly creeps like an incoming tide of hazy grey wash, subdued sparks of sunlight glinting off its silky surface. "Memories of Love" follows in a similar vein, delivering fistfuls of emotional angst over a short space of time before a subtly triumphant crescendo makes you hit the rewind button and go through it again.
Tonally, "Why Don't You" takes a bit of a U-turn, throwing R&B-ish vocal samples at a gyrating canvas and picking out details of each at seemingly random intervals. It may not be as perfectly realised as last year's "Viewpoint," but it's got similar aims in mind. For me, the only letdown on the EP is "Knowledge," in which overly bright congas dominate what is otherwise another excellent example of Synkro's ability to create stark, intimidating landscapes and make them seem like entirely lovely places in which to find yourself.
Tracklist A1 Broken Promise
A2 Why Dont You
B1 Memories Of Love
B2 Knowledge