LAMB – The Secret Of Letting Go – 2XLP, Cooking Vinyl, 2019

The newest record from trip-hop and electronic pioneers, LAMB.

Written and recorded in the space of a year between their home-studio in England’s South Downs and in India and Ibiza, Lamb’s seventh full-length album The Secret of Letting Go is all about the space between sounds. From album opener “Phosphorus'” minimalist harmonics to the dying choral embers of “One Hand Clapping” through the snaking sub-bass drops that drive the title track and “Moonshine” and into the whirl and spin of “Deep Delirium” and the simple piano loops that help “Imperial Measures” float above you, there’s space everywhere. Sometimes it’s evocative of sun-drenched horizons, at others it is contemplative, reflective; occasionally the space is itchy and anticipatory, pointing towards moments of ecstatic abandon. Throughout the record though, it’s the space that allows Lou Rhodes’ superlunary voice to glide and soar gloriously to bridge the silences in-between. It’s all of this together that makes The Secret of Letting Go such an utterly compelling return to form.

1. Phosphorous
2. Moonshine
3. Armageddon Waits
4. Bulletproof
5. The Secret of Letting Go
6. Imperial Measures
7. The Other Shore
8. Deep Delirium
9. Illumina
10. The Silence In Between
11. One Hand Clapping