conjure up visions of the busiest forest in the world, dense with hopping rabbits, canoes gliding down the river, and elvish creatures serenading you from thickets and trees. Or perhaps it’s a traffic jam in heaven—a pastel tangle of woodwinds, guitar, drums, keys, synths, and vocals as tickly as wind rushing past your ears. The duo’s latest, , is their prettiest, poppiest rush-hour prog-jazz clusterfuck yet.
Performed by an octet, this album expands FIG’s style into full-blown hyper-colored odysseys. Their cultishly adored debut, , was recorded entirely on mono cassette, lending it a charmingly stuffy, attic-dusty atmosphere. The follow-up, , was done in a single night, with many tracks zipping by in two minutes or less.
is the result of Zach Phillips, Ma Clément, and their bandmates taking more time. Last summer, they slipped away to a bucolic farm and studio in the Catskills for a week, where the group deployed a technique Phillips calls “live in triplicate.” They laid three varying live takes and then, in meticulous post-production sessions, subtracted bits to land on a final collage of the performances.
The idea that they subtracted anything is hard to believe, because the finished product still often sounds like multiple jam sessions superimposed, a buzzing hive of harmonized insanity. The way it’s mixed feels almost like they’re trying to prevent listeners from extricating and discerning the components—is that keening texture a viola? Are those two .
