Rounds

About

If Four Tet’s 2001 album <i>Pause</i> marks the first time all the pieces of Kieran Hebden’s sound crystallized into a coherent whole—where harp and acoustic guitar spread, prism-like, over a bristling expanse of breakbeats—<i>Rounds</i>, from two years later, takes a step further into the unknown. The elements are largely the same here: plucked and hammered strings spun into wistful loops and set to a fluttering pulse of brushed snare, jazz sample, and psych-rock tambourine. But stranger sounds materialized, too. The odd lick of sitar, stomp box, or whoopee cushion occasionally surfaces in the mix, throwing careful arrangements thrillingly off balance; these small, provocative details keep the mood of enveloping, almost overwhelming gorgeousness from falling back upon mere prettine. .

via Apple Music

The Clerk says

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