Pioneering, unclassifiable, and constantly renewing themselves, the legendary Australian band Hiatus Kaiyote have honoured us this year with a new, fourth album: Love Heart Cheat Code. With each new release, the band seems to create a whole new universe, dense and eccentric, while remaining true to its neo-soul/neo-jazz identity.
This new album reuses the band’s trademark elements: rich vocal textures, carried by singer Nai Palm, highly polished synth colors, always striving for a very modern sound, and an almost prog feel to their compositions, as each piece explores ideas and ambiances that are both advanced and surprising. Harmonically and rhythmically, the band gives themselves total freedom.
Love Heart Cheat Code explores more orchestral colours: bowed strings, plucked strings (sometimes reminiscent of sitar, sometimes harp), transverse flute, and even triangle, mixed with their trademark genius with much more electronic sounds: synth bass, various synths, production effects … A tour de force they execute to perfection, creating a singular sound universe: at once profoundly heterogeneous, yet totally coherent and united throughout the album. A whole in which the songs sometimes respond to each other, around strong titles like “Everything is Beautiful,” a true cry from the heart filled with gratitude.
Hiatus Kaiyote has played its new universe card to the hilt, with a brand new graphic identity and pop-ups featuring mascots in the image of the blue symbols that cover their visuals: a brilliant delirium pushed to the limit, just like they’ve always done: totally immersed in their uniqueness and eccentricity.
