Blood Orange – Coastal Grooves

After Test Icicles disintegrated, Dev Hynes claimed he never liked the music anyway. With the inauguration of new project Blood Orange, it waits to be seen whether any of his work as Lightspeed Champion will receive a similar dismissal. The style shift is less pronounced this time, but is sufficiently distinct from his other endeavours to warrant cordoning it off.

Coastal Grooves is true to its title, locking into danceable grooves rather than flying off on forced-wacky tangents. As a result, it has less character than, say, Lightspeed debut Falling Off the Lavender Bridge, but the quality is less erratic. Oddly, his time spent writing for Solange and X-Factor’s ‘indie, honestly’ flameout Diana Vickers (amongst others) seems to have reduced the number of hooks and pop twists in his music; as a result, the parts don’t distinguish themselves from one another with any great conviction, though the whole stays classy. [Chris Buckle]