The duo of Nuno Rosa and Ricardo Costa record for the newly formed excellent MP3 label en:pegDigital under the name Polar. Their debut album Light Years can be regarded as a random gallery of various styles all executed with quiet skill and fluid direction, changing ever so often in slight gestures pleasing to the ear. “Krakatoa” begins the gallery tour with a ghostly somber atmosphere flowing into trebly drum machines answering the calls of minor spectral pads bathed in reverb. Moving on past the dark corners of “Krakatoa,” “Mercurio” shines with light, sunny melodies that gently kiss the skittering clicks weaving in and out of rhythmic static. After the brightness fades, the isolated chord heard in the intro to “Iodo” brings to mind a painting of a distant desert horizon moments before dawn, only to reveal a complex metropolis of machines awakened by the naked light mimicked by intricate rhythm workouts.
Polar then proceeds to take us out of the desert and into space with the album’s title track weaving a beat-by-beat absorbing tale of the nature of time past, present and future, hence the name Light Years. Space melts into a virtual dancefloor with the aptly-named “Fudge” approaching a mid-tempo sensibility with carefully constructed grooves for equally satisfying multiple taste-tests. Taking a seat in the smoke lounge, “Fosil” is a mellow sequencer exercise with well-placed echoing organ minding its business as the rhythm track playfully glides by. The tour concludes with “Bransky,” an original rapid brainstorm of clicks, beats and emotion that ends Light Years with the feeling that this is just the start for a promising new name and to be on the lookout for their next enjoyable release.
Light Years is out now on en:pegDigital.
