Hurray! It’s summer and that can only mean one thing: chillwave artists the world over are pushing to get their albums out while the sun is shining. Hot on the heels of a long-player from contemporary and friend Washed Out comes the fifth album from Toro Y Moi, ‘Boo Boo’.
If you’re christened Chazwick Bradley Bundick (Chaz Bear to his mates), you’re almost certainly destined to do something a little different with your life. Since getting his start with a high school indie-rock band, Bundick’s path has changed dramatically over the subsequent decade and a half.
Since 2009, or thereabouts, he has been a purveyor of the slick electronic beats and smooth vocals that have become Toro Y Moi’s trademark. His breakthrough came in 2010 with the release of debut ‘Causers of This’, which along with Washed Out’s ‘Life of Leisure’ EP set out chillwave’s mission statement with aplomb, delivering slow-paced retro-sounding pop music to the clamouring masses.
The main issue with chillwave itself is that the term fell out of fashion as quickly as it entered the music lover’s lexicon. Therefore, it’s something of a challenge for Bundick to garner any interest with this latest release, but he’s certainly trying his damndest.
Where Washed Out falls down is his somewhat limited vocal range, but Bundick doesn’t have that problem. His sweet, soulful style instantly sets the tone from the off with Mirage – a song that is as urgent as chillwave allows, with the added bonus of a blissful ‘80s soul breakdown.
There’s further evidence elsewhere that Chaz is now a little more comfortable with his vocals. Hark back to his debut and there would be a wave of samples rather than a sweetly-sung lyric, but on No Show there’s barely anything but. Interspersed with a throbbing bass lick, this is as minimalist as the record gets and is one of its shorter songs, but as it gives prominence Bundick’s voice it turns out to be one of the highlights.
Mona Lisa follows and really embraces some darker pop elements. It is almost split in half, from the upbeat opening to its muted outro. It’s always been difficult to ascertain the reasoning behind some of of Bundick’s writing, but here and elsewhere on ‘Boo Boo’ he appears to be voicing recent relationship issues; usually a failsafe subject to approach for inspiration.
A more sombre period kicks off with the instrumental Pavement, the truly deep Don’t Try and the vocoder-drenched Windows, which could slide in effortlessly on Drake’s recent effort ‘Views’. The tempo and mood takes a takes an upward turn with Girl Like You, which again lifts from the Drake school of chart-troubling R’n’B, before descending once more to some more low-key numbers including the genre-splitting closer W.I.W.W.T.W.
‘Boo Boo’ is an album that keeps us engaged thanks to frequent changes in structure; not just throughout the record but during each song. There are several cuts here that are unrecognisable as the same song at the beginning and end, but that’s testament to the maturity of Bundick’s writing. His idea of chillwave is alive and kicking.
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