The primary album that Loraine James recorded as Regardless of the Climate superior a novel idea: Every monitor was titled after a temperature studying on the Celsius scale, like “25°C” or “6°C,” meant to approximate the artist’s “emotional temperature” when she recorded it. You may think the tracklisting as a meteorological map, a patchwork of variegated blues and reds working from frigid cerulean to sweltering scarlet. However in distinction to that prescriptive rubric, Regardless of the Climate left questions of relative warmth or chilly solely as much as the listener. Do the glitching pads of “17°C” sound extra like breaking surf or branching ice crystals? Is the wistful piano of “14°C” extra evocative of George Winston’s new-age basic Autumn or its sequel, Winter Into Spring? Some may take into account that ambiguity a flaw, however I discover it refreshing. How straightforward it might have been to sketch out a self-evident spectrum, from icy drones to balmy Balearic tones, and name it a day. James’ album instructed that synesthesia is as messy as our emotions themselves.
She sticks with the idea on Regardless of the Climate II. This time, the metaphorical scale is rather less extreme: from 1°C (a frosty 34°F) to 26°C (a summery however not oppressive 79°F), in distinction to the previous album, which flitted between the freezing level and the brink of a warmth wave. Maybe accordingly, the brand new document’s stylistic vary is relatively abbreviated. Regardless of the Climate wandered freely throughout the tranquility of ambient, the itchy restlessness of IDM, and the aggression of drum’n’bass, even folding in a number of vocal passages influenced by Midwestern emo. WtWII is extra targeted, with a palette organized round muted synth pads, minimalist preparations, and faint dustings of digital distortion. The final album usually used ambient as a gateway to extra unpredictable zones; on the brand new one, it’s a homing beacon.
The brand new album’s relative coherence may need one thing to do with the intent behind its making. The primary album grew out of stray productions created through the recording of 2021’s Reflection; it additionally included a number of five-year-old mission recordsdata that James had by no means discovered a house for. This time, she cleared her studio schedule with a purpose to focus on new Regardless of the Climate materials, following a first-thought-best-thought method—{hardware} synths, results pedals, little in the best way of overdubs—that favored instinct and circulation.
The result’s a few of the most direct, spontaneous music in James’ catalog. Tracks really feel much less like songs or compositions than tone poems, temper items that circulation naturally from one to the subsequent, like clouds altering form excessive overhead. After a short scene-setting intro (“It’s a bit chilly, innit?” James muses over glitching pads and vocal samples in “1°C”), “3°C” pairs hopeful synth pads with faint glitches and squeals, suggesting the refined drama of emotional liftoff; on the next “18°C,” the identical chords curl inward and darken, sounding extra guarded regardless of the ostensibly hotter forecast.
