A full-length album just released from Elstow is quite a gorgeous one and it takes these electronic and natural textures and rolls them up into a record with layers and moods to it. Songs fluctuate and flow of intensities and drifts which build into a sort of luxurious atmosphere that you end up floating around with.
The Electric Ocean is a record that you listen to with headphones on. There are loads of these textures melting in and out of each other. You get such particular and sonically warm synths and key tones throughout the unfolding of the album.
This is all part of how they can build such a lush and full-bodied feeling atmosphere.
This is an album that you really should hear all the way through.
It's an escape. This record can pull you away from wherever you are and whatever you are doing and put you in a completely different world for a moment in time and this is something I consider to be quite rare and beautiful.
Combining bedroom, dream, indie, and alternative pop is a brilliant approach. All of these different aspects and genres are what shape this record.
The whole thing comes with a very particular aesthetic that can have edgier moments but also moments that let you drift alongside the soundscapes.
This is an engulfing record that encompasses so many gorgeous approaches and sounds, tones, and textures, that you get wrapped up in everything and eventually washed away with it as well.
The vocal approach on top of all of this is brilliant. It adds plenty of character and personality to the songs that weren't there before. Now, don't get me wrong, the songs do have character already. The music itself delivers plenty of that.
But the vocals bring more of it. Texturally, the vocals bring in something that changes the aesthetic just enough to make it feel different.
Not only should you be listening to this record as a whole, but you should be listening to it with headphones on.
First of all, this feels like a concept album because the songs sound like they are interconnected in certain ways.
Listening to only one or two tracks from the album may give you a little idea or just of what you can expect but will not give you anywhere near the full spectrum of what the album has to offer as a whole.
Listening to it with headphones on your ears is one of the best ways to soak in all of these different layers and atmospheres that come with the unfolding of the release.
It has notes, tones, pads, and sounds that float through the ethers of some of these songs which really gives depth and vastness to their underbellies.
headphones bring those out more and let you sink deeper into the sounds of this record.
You can tell there was a lot of attention to detail during the creation process but it still has a lot of heart and it never loses that character which may be the most important aspect of the entire thing.
Another thing that's important here is the mix. I don't always talk about the mix of a song but here it's completely imperative.
Whoever was responsible for mixing this record had the right idea and understood the mission.
This is the sort of record where if the mix is off, the aesthetic doesn't come through the way it was meant to.
The whole album was constructed with a vibe in mind and it really does work.
Again, listen to this with headphones on and all the way through. It is a 10-track record including the intro and spans almost 45 minutes or so.
It's a real album you can get swept away in and it feels great to do exactly that.
Remember where you heard it first.
BANDCAMP
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