Review: Flying Lotus / Cosmogramma

Flying Lotus.
Cosmogramma.
Warp.

Reviewer – Lucy Horwood.

Experimental trailblazer Flying Lotus produces yet another prolific exemplar of multi-genre musical cohesion. Preserving his reputable footing as a high-brow artist of electronic craftsmanship, Cosmogramma explores the realms beneath and beyond hip-hop.

2008’s Los Angeles launched FlyLo’s take-off as a musical pioneer and has provided the gateway to an entire cosmos of electronic eclecticism like no other. Taking us on an enchanted journey through the richly textured sounds and psychedelic shadows of a multi-dimensional soundscape, FlyLo combines upbeat with downbeat tempos to produce a plateau on which fragmented and abstract sounds are blended to display a cohesive spectrum of musical quotations.

The dizzying kaleidoscope of ‘Clock Catcher’ infused with the familiar glitch-hop throb ascends into the exquisite harp strings of ‘Cosmic Drama’, creating a spiraling synthesis that breathes hypnosis into the downtempo rhythms of ‘Zodiac Shit’, that recoil and explode into the energy rush of ‘Pure Being’. The progressive momentum built up by the escalating pulsation of FlyLo’s trademark beats anticipates the apex of Radiohead’s Thom Yorke, ‘…And the World Laughs with You’ marking it as the definitive track of the album.

The album descends into a rich fusion of deep jazz and blues in ‘Do the Astral Plan’ before falling deeper into the yawning depths of a subterranean underworld of diverse tribal beats in what for me is the most dynamic track of the compilation, ‘Recoiled’. Tumbling into a fusion of delicate musical shapes, ‘Table Tennis’ revisits the rapture of Laura Darlington’s ethereal vocals.

Whereas Los Angeles and 1983 are much about the individual track, Cosmogramma is characterised by its sampling. Snippets of jazz, soul and funk are pasted together to cover a vast scale of electronic variety. Samples are concentrated, layered and then stripped back to create a soundscape of inexhaustible musical production.

Cosmogramma keeps us constantly on our toes, a teasing, addictive blend of all elements electronic featuring collaborations with the likes of Ravi Coltrane, Thundercat, Erykah Badu and Miguel Atwood-Ferguson. A hybrid of dynamic and diverse sounds, Cosmogramma defines Flying Lotus’ production not just an exercise in musical finesse, but as an entire generation of music that transcends spheres of musical experimentation.

Cosmagramma is out on Warp Records on May 3rd.