LWW - 3PE

  by Erick Mertz

published: 3 / 11 / 2018

Label: Leaf Label
Format: CD

intro

Enthralling space rock on debut album from LWW, the new project of Portland, Oregon musician and AU frontman Luke Wyland

The opening track on '3PE', 'CTP' starts off as a clarion call. It’s an autumn morning, time for the ritual of waking, a vision expressed through clear siren like tones. That clarity is, of course, a deception. The morning call is not as obvious. 'CTP' begins to meander through mincing strings and a series of blown out guitar tones. The track takes a delightfully long time to build, almost six minutes, into a dance beat that really kicks out. Churning to the end, 'CTP' is lucid and mobile, only to die into silence. The track is like a whole day, nay a lifetime, in nine minutes. As fun as the sound circus on '3PE' feels, it’s a challenge for the listener to keep track of. That does not mean you shouldn’t try though. The second track 'P&B' is Spartan minimalism, stirring and dreamy. 'DTE' pops and buzzes like a weird, cosmic chorus, best surmised in a scene: imagine that it’s your job to listen to space noise through a rusty old speaker… then after listening for days on end, suddenly, this comes through. What intelligent life is that? The cheery sensation of 'PNO' makes me envision a merry-go-round on Mars, as characterized in a brochure at the 1964 Worlds Fair in New York City, bright and colorfully dated, yet filled with the latent uncertainty of interstellar exploration. The astral carnival doesn’t last forever though, ending on – or more like bleeding into 'PRC' the last, longest track, which is an eleven-minute tribal drumbeat, accentuated with bells and light secondary percussion. This album isn’t a drowsy experimentation. That the track titles are stripped bare to initials is a suggestion, at least to me, that deriving meaning is up to your imagination. Luke Wyland, the Portland, Oregon artist behind LWW, is also responsible for art-pop experiment, AU, a project that blends his signature quirk with pop accessibility. On this work of art though, he has sanded down the pop elements, but the result isn’t an opaque work either. It feels like something. It translates to work bigger than itself. Taken as a whole, LWW makes me feel like I’ve discovered someone’s secret. Like I’ve peeled back a rock and found the ecosystem underneath. Among the rare delights, LWW’s '3PE' can be your private, bedroom obsession too, if only you allow it inside.

Track Listing:-

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