Since I was first introduced to their heavy future-focused tunes through Youngsta‘s ‘Minimal Monday’s’ on Rinse FM some years ago, Welsh three piece LSN have continued to tear it up year after year. Last year saw the trio rise to new heights with releases on genre leading labels Albion Collective and Artikal Music and for their first move in 2020, they return to Artikal with ‘Automation‘ EP. We’re treated to four tracks of their signature future flavoured productions featuring the always elegant vocals of Simetra.
Beginning with the appropriately named ‘A.I’, LSN initiates the journey through their visionary, dystopian world of intrusive artificial intelligence and overarching robotics. Simetra‘s all powerful distorted vocals cut through the rough ever-growing mid range, rapid breaks and vivid cybernated glitches. On ‘Spirit Dub‘, LSN engages in a battle of powerful minimalism, one that they’ve conquered before on the likes of ‘I Don’t Know What That Means’ and my absolute personal favourite ‘Fear & Love‘. This second track builds up so effortlessly, steadily growing from a stand alone simmering low end and wall shaking kicks into an intensive full-bodied roller with it’s tribal-like drum work. As expected (although very unique) glitched-out samples consistently rip through as LSN continues to paint a stark picture of their apocalyptic vision of future techno-lead worlds. Like an empress of such worlds, Simetra‘s vocals once again fall into place so organically and never deters from the texture-filled Neuromancer soundscape. On the flip, LSN initially delivers another progressive piece of minimal goodness. ‘Machine‘ bashfully marches through, it’s footsteps heavy, leading the way towards a pure stroke of genius where the ‘machine’ begins to communicate rather colourfully through a jazzy improv-esque talk box section. With variety in mind, the EP closes with ‘Breakin’, a unique funk/grime/dubstep hybrid featuring more funky talk box action, incredibly dynamic and energetic percs and a range of colourful synth work. A superb climax to the record and most likely my favourite of the four.
LSN‘s body of work is already super impressive and if you haven’t dug in by now then you’ve got an absolute treat waiting for you! However with that said, ‘Automation‘ EP may very well be the groups finest, most polished piece of work I’ve heard from them to date.
ARTKL046 is out this Friday (24th January) and available on vinyl and digitally from the Artikal Music Bandcamp.
Check out LSN on Soundcloud.
Check out Artikal Music on Soundcloud and Twitter.