Perfume Genius - Too Bright - VINYL LP

Belgian producer Sim Nagai continues his sonic wanderlust with Up North, a fifteen-track escapade that masterfully brings together vintage aesthetics and contemporary beat craftsmanship. His third album for Cold Busted, this collection flows like a half-remembered dream through landscapes familiar and strange, proving his quick ascent in the downtempo scene was no accident. Throughout Up North, Nagai demonstrates his gift for musical moments that buzz between nostalgia and newness, creating spaces where memory and imagination groove to the perfect beat. Go north, my friend!

Over the course of two astonishing albums, Perfume Genius, aka Seattle native Mike Hadreas, cemented his place as a singer/songwriter of rare frankness, creating songs that, while achingly emotional, offered empathy and hope, rather than any judgment or Hand wringing. Sparse, gorgeous and with Hadrea's quavering vocals often only accompanied by piano, they were uncommonly beautiful tales of a life lived on the dark side. Scarred, brutalized, yet ultimately, slowly but surely reclaimed.

'Glory' by Perfume Genius has a pristine surface and a tender, roiling underside. Mike Hadreas' seventh album is muscular, filled out by his partner in life and songcraft Alan Wyffels and longtime producer Blake Mills alongside the fiercest band Perfume Genius has ever assembled guitarists Meg Duffy and Greg Uhlmann, drummers Tim Carr and Jim Keltner, and bassist Pat Kelly. These players marshall their power, and Hadreas his macabre imaginings and gallows humor, to humane ends. Perfume Genius pries open a mildewed den full of alienation, longing and desire and let's it bask in the sunlight.