Twink – Happy Houses (Twink Tones)

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Twink

Boston-based electronic producer Mike Langlie originally began his musical alter ego Twink when he chanced upon a children’s toy piano in a thrift store, a discovery that lead to his eventually building up a collection of the instruments. More than twelve years after the release of his debut self-titled album, Langlie continues to push an astonishing range of different moods and textures out of the toy piano’s deceptively childlike tones, with this latest album ‘Happy Houses’ offering up Twink’s ninth release in total. While toy piano remains the central focus on the eight tracks collected here though, there’s a noticeably bigger feel compared to preceding Twink albums, with the melodic electro-pop structures being bolstered this time by live bass, guitars and horns. While ‘Close To Home’ opens proceedings on a playful note as plinking piano keys pick their way across a backdrop of bouncy synth-bass and toytown synths, only for dark undercurrents of distorted synths to suddenly surge from the undergrowth, this is certainly no twee listening experience.

‘Ostrich Hop’ meanwhile sends proggy synth arpeggios and gamelan-esque metallic percussion gliding against moody dubstep swells as majestic jazz horns signal a sudden acceleration forward into samba drum machine rhythms and organs. Elsewhere, ‘Gumdrop Glitter’ takes things off on a ride through brittle house rhythms and plastic-sounding gamecore synths that sees dreamy xylophone textures dropping in as the beats suddenly get shuffled into grime-y rolls, before ‘Turtle Trap’ drops things back down in moody downbeat jazz territory, sending live bass runs wandering against chiming toy piano keys and wooden percussion as flutes suddenly snake out of the woodwork. In this case Langlie’s decision to employ a lusher instrumental palette has certainly paid off, and I have to confess that this is probably my favourite out of the Twink records I’ve heard.

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A dastardly man with too much music and too little time on his hands

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