- Experimental club and left-field pop hybrids to leave dancers both slack-jawed and wired.
- Every once in a while, a record comes around that sends a thrilling sensation—something like an electric jolt or a seductive shiver—through the body. This zingy symptom usually comes with the exhilarating experience of hearing music that sounds ineffably new, even progressive, for the first time. I had this feeling hearing Onyx, the latest EP from the Leeds-based producer Stolen Velour. As the founder at the wheel of the UK imprint and party series Treehouse, he's a self-proclaimed mingler of "techno, galactic club and pop anthems," and the new record (also his first for the New York experimental club label Kindergarten Records) certainly places a heavy emphasis on the latter two.
Stolen Velour is a devout maximalist. If he were to adhere to any scripture, it would detail the sanctity of heaving, Afro-diasporic rhythms, neon-hued hyperpop and snickering, almost cartoonish melodies. Onyx resides on the borderline of various genres that could be categorized as "extreme." There's the metallic, ultra-modern take of gqom in "Tibi Bat," a peak-time cut that includes one of the record's most teary-eyed buildups, one that sounds designed for a high-production EDM festival—except it's pulled off with taste. The record's title track lifts from bombastic East Coast club music with its stuttering vocals as much as it cribs from hyperpop with its high-impact, sticky synths.
"Symbiosis" features the kinds of sounds you'd hear on an Arca or SOPHIE album, with tricky arpeggiated synths that cartwheel over oppressive kicks. A remix by Jabes turns it into an end-of-days reggaeton-gqom hybrid, with intoxicating tension broken by a blood-curdling scream. It's one of just many moments across the roving EP more energy-boosting than 65 mg of caffeine.
Tracklist01. Symbiosis
02. Tibi Bat
03. Onyx
04. Symbiosis (Jabes Remix)