Flying Lotus | Cosmogramma

Warp (2010)
By CARRIE BATTAN  |  May 3, 2010
2.5 2.5 Stars

 OTR043010_FlyLotus_main

Only an experimental laptop artist whose music exists primarily for pensive white weedheads would purport his new album to be “basically the studies that map out the universe and the relations of heaven and hell,” as Flying Lotus — a/k/a Steven Ellison — did in a January interview with Pitchfork. You’ve gotta hand it to the guy for nailing his own pretenses, though — Cosmogramma is decidedly more, uh, cosmic, than his 2008 Los Angeles, in its atmospheric spiral away from the beat and toward a more free-flowing collage of instrumentation.

An ode to his late and great aunt Alice Coltrane, this disc is heavy on jazzy flows and orchestral elements, all backlit by Ellison’s trademark crackles and glitches. And let’s not forget the star-studded guest list.

Harpist Rebecca Raff shines with her Pearly Gate–sent plucks throughout, Thundercat jumps in on an endlessly sprawling “Mmmhmm,” and Laura Darlington’s heartbreakingly breathy vocals — which made for one of Los Angeles’s best tracks (“Auntie’s Lock/Infinitum”) — return on “Table Tennis.” Then, of course, there’s that dude from the band Atoms for Peace (Thom Yorke, or something like that), whose vocal appearance on “And the World Laughs with You” makes Cosmogramma feel a whole lot like The Eraser for a couple of minutes.

Related: Review: Lady Gaga at the Wang, Ghost stories, Winged migration, More more >
  Topics: CD Reviews , Entertainment, Entertainment, Thundercat,  More more >
| More


Most Popular
ARTICLES BY CARRIE BATTAN
Share this entry with Delicious
  •   MAIN ATTRAKIONZ | 808S AND DARK GRAPES II  |  September 07, 2011
    Following a steady stream of low-budget tracks, mixtapes, and videos posted on their Tumblr this year, the Bay-area stoner rap duo of Squadda B and MondreM.A.N. (a/k/a Main Attrakionz) have raised the stakes by offering up something that resembles a traditional release.
  •   LIL B | I'M GAY (I'M HAPPY)  |  July 19, 2011
    Gone are the endless declarations of hoes on his dick in groups of 30 and 100; gone are the claims that he is everyone from Ellen Degeneres to Miley Cyrus.
  •   SHABAZZ PALACES | BLACK UP  |  June 09, 2011
    The musical reincarnation of Ishmael Butler, the elusive Seattle rapper who makes up one-third of the semi-popular '90s jazz-rap act Digable Planets under the name Butterfly, is a lot to unpack.
  •   FRIENDLY FIRES | PALA  |  June 07, 2011
    For a densely layered, expertly produced dance-rock album, this second full-length from British three-piece Friendly Fires is perplexingly bland.
  •   THE WEEKND | HOUSE OF BALLOONS  |  April 27, 2011
    Self-release (2011)

 See all articles by: CARRIE BATTAN