Pinkunoizu – The Drop

There’s more than a whiff of prog about The Drop, the second LP from this Danish quartet, from the disorienting, pitch-bent synths of opener The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, to the concept-heavy titles and lyrics (The Swollen Map was inspired by the Borges story of the same name, about a map which grows to be larger than the landscape it represents). On closer inspection, however, the more salient reference points lie within the lineage of 70s krautrock.

Thus, a motorik beat underpins much of the record, as on Necromancer and Tin Can Valley; but in both cases, the template is twisted to accommodate bold, epic chord progressions, varied percussive textures, and elements of psych-rock. When Pinkunoizu eschew this eclectic, free-spirited take on their influences, The Drop loses some of its gleeful, restless energy; but it never descends into the kind of self-absorbed indulgence that a cursory glance might suggest. [Sam Wiseman]