inthemix | Music News | Flying Lotus

Following the well received ‘Reset EP’, man of the moment Flying Lotus comes with his first long-player for the fabled Warp Records. One would be hard-pressed to escape the gathering momentum surrounding this hotly-tipped producer. A press release author’s wet dream, Steven Ellison hails form a distinguished musical lineage, with his aunt being none other than the legendary Alice Coltrane. But don’t for a second think that the young Lotus would lapse into tepid jazz-hop fusion shtick in some vain quest to pay homage to his musical heritage. Operating on a neat axis of hip hop and electronica, Fly Lo’s wonky beatplay owes as much to Dilla and Pre Fuse 73 as it does Dizzy, Miles or Coltrane.

Los Angeles is instead Flying Lotus’ homage to the city in which Ellison has lived all his life: “With this record I wanted to try and BRING folks LA. Los Angeles is a place with many faces, so I tried to represent all the LA vibes the best way I could.” Having never been to Los Angeles personally, it is difficult to gauge how successful Ellison has been in achieving this objective. But certainly this is an image of the south Californian metropolis far removed from the classic gangster romanticism espoused by the most prolific alumni of Compton and Long Beach. If his album is anything to go by, then the city must fluctuate between glamour, despair and violence in the blink of an eye as Fly Lo’s brief stanzas flicker past in quick succession.

Los Angeles runs a gamut of vibes and emotions over the course of its 43 minutes. Marked with contrasts, the album is in parts dreamy and ethereal ( Golden Diva, Beginner’s Falafel ), sleazy and grimy ( Riot ) or shiny and synthetic, with a gaudy sheen of freshly minted faux tan ( Parisian Goldfish ). Elsewhere, the bollywood roller disco boogie intro of GNG BNG gives way to the bombastic riffing funk – replete with a neat edited drum break where Ellison bashes out the beats on his trusty MPC, and Melt sounds like the African tribal block party you always wish you had. Ellison rounds out the album in fine style with the deliciously smoky Testament and the eerie vocal of Infinitum, revealing a delicateness that recalls his sublime Tea Leaf Dancers.

Ellison’s attention to detail invites the listener to discover the micro details hidden in the depths of his murky compositions. At times claustrophobic, the elements of his dense mixes fight for air as FlyLo treads a tenuous tightrope between funk and murky abstraction. Static, fuzz and distant radio signals are all shades which feature in his palette.

Flying Lotus stumbles through the streets of Los Angeles in a woozy narcosis as his particular brand of off-kilter wonk-hop bumps its way through the night. Short of enlisting the questionable services of Sir Richard Branson, Fly Lo’s debut longplayer for Warp is likely the closest this reviewer will get to LA this year. See you there.

Check out the tracklisting…

1. Brainfeeder
2. Breathe Something/Stellar Star
3. Beginners Falafel
4. Camel
5. Melt
6. Comet Course
7. Orbit 405
8. Golden Diva
9. Riot
10. GNG BNG
11. Parisian Goldfish
12. Sleepy Dinosaur
13. RobertaFlack
14. SexSlaveShip
15. Auntie’s Harp
16. Testament
17. Auntie’s Lock Infinitum

And check out the promo clip for Los Angeles below…