LLLL — a veteran chillwave outfit, former J-Pop composer, and one-time Bones sample — stitches translucent quilts with decades worth of dream-pop detritus. Hold their latest tapestry, “Falling,” up to a natural light source and squint to see its folds and nubbles pop from their ghostly surface: mechatronic happy-hardcore kicks keep a New Romantic synthscape gravitationally pressed to the earth, forming glacial valleys. Guest vocalist U-Pistol aims for a register sitting on the border between Robert Smith’s lovable anguish and that slippery intimacy conveyed best by A-ha’s Morten Harket. Flourishes of 16-bit melody that uniformly appear across the ZOOM LENS label’s discography thread the fissures between genre distinctions.
“Falling” is seamlessly without form, outside of time. Cling on too tightly and it eludes you, like one of these things. It’s best viewed as a work of impressionism, viewed from afar, without warning. Drop it in a playlist and let it catch you off-guard — a striking gallery piece on a stark, white wall.
Time fading away
Still stuck in dreaming
Like falling apart
Scared of believing
I don’t wanna wake till I fall asleep
I’m trying to get away from reality I’m falling
Feels like drowning
I just wanna break from misery
My life has really taken all the best of me
I’ve fallen
Feels like drowning
Don’t cast me away
Hold me I’m lonely
Night comes into play
Walls closing on me