Lucas Radi, drummer for Brazilian shoegaze band Synx (whose Desaguar I reviewed previously), has released the first single from his upcoming solo project. It’s a pretty significant departure from that band’s sound, with Radi describing the music in terms of IDM, deconstructed club, and ambient.

These aren’t genres I have a tremendous amount of experience with, so I’m not going to pretend I can tell you exactly what’s happening musically or where all the different elements fit. What I can tell you is what the listening experience is like.

“You’d Never Guess” is a short, atmospheric track that begins with a cloud-like electronic sound that seems to surround everything. A little piano or bass-like synth figure starts climbing up a scale, only to stutter, stop, and start again, almost as if it’s struggling to find its way forward.

Then things get a little stranger. A spoken-word sample enters, which I eventually recognized as a fun reference to Twin Peaks and its famously good coffee. The dialogue gets chopped up and manipulated, almost like an electronic record scratch, accompanied by distorted, backward-sounding effects and a light drumbeat. It gradually builds before circling back to the atmospheric sounds from the beginning, with another little bit of coffee-related dialogue bringing things to a close.

For a genre I’m not particularly familiar with, this was a fascinating little interstellar snapshot into a different musical world. It’s only about two and a half minutes long, but there’s a lot happening in that short stretch of time. I’m excited to discover more of what Radi is doing with this solo project and see how it develops, particularly alongside the very different musical world he’s exploring with Synx.

Verdict: Worth a Spin

Explore more from Lucas Radi

Official Site | Spotify | Bandcamp