GAMBLE, LEE
A MILLION PIECES OF YOU EP (HYPERDUB)
Lee Gamble completes his `Flush Real Pharynx 2019-2021' album cycle with `A Million Pieces Of You', the third EP of a triptych written in a time when the subjective experience of overload came to a halt, giving way to an overbearing sense of loss, burnout and a desperate need for hope.
These seven tracks feel more reflective, more human than the two preceeding EPs; the serpentine dopplers and seductive supercar engines of `In A Paraventral Scale', and imploding motion sculptures of `Exhaust'.
A deepfake of Lee's voice appears from the chaotic slow-mo crash of `Balloon Lossy', timidly telling of "[garbled]_ good news".
The uncanny spectre of deep fakes, AI and deep learning models give way to the melancholic loneliness of the solo piano in `Empty Middle Seat'.
Then glimmering, golden pads on `Hyperpassive' slowly crawl into the hopeful, bright arpeggiations of `Balloon Copy'.
`A Million Pieces Of You' is a ride through a part-synthetic, part-modelled, part-imitation, part-taught, part-human, part-hopeful, part-reflective and paradoxically affirmative space - an involuntarily fitting finale to an album originally conceived in a world different to the one we now inhabit.