- It was only going to be a matter of time before Lone did something on R&S. Not only does he fit in nicely with the revitalised imprint's recruitment drive of bright young things, but his throwback-inflected and twitchingly melodic style mirrors their historical relevance/leading edge present to a tee. Here, he amps up his recent style, delivering six banging, dance floor-centric tracks.
As a keen raver who also believes that unborn foetuses should be played Boards of Canada by law, to my mind Lone and R&S is a great combination. "Explorers" is just one of the tracks that shows his love of the Warp duo, with pitch bending pads that phase out into the sunset. The EP is packed full of sparkling, cerulean synth lines in combinations that evoke various types of summer-hazed and innocent emotions, like M83 but removing all but a hint of the reflectiveness.
Heavy cascades of rippling harps make "Dolphin" unrepentantly laidback, and "Blossom Quarter" has softened 8-bit bleeps and (yes) kiddie vocals, adding up to bewildered playfulness. The growling bassline on "Approaching Rainbow" is the closest he gets to darkside tendencies, but there's loooooads of punching 909 snares and plenty of rhythmic heaviness all over Echolocations, whether it's a funky thump on "Rainbow," four-to-the-floor alternated with jump-up breakbeat like in "Coreshine Voodoo" or something plucked from the intermediate spectrum. It'd soften the hardest floor—but without losing energy.
Tracklist 01. Coreshine Voodoo
02. Explorers
03. Dolphin
04. Approaching Rainbow
05. Rapid Racer
06. Blossom Quarter