Yuno – Moodie

‘Moodie’ is packed with special sonic moves and a refreshingly wilful disregard for genre.

Label: Sub Pop
Released: 15th June 2018
Rating: ★★★

Coming from Jacksonville, Florida – which gave us turgid Southern rockers Lynyrd Skynyrd, actually pretty great Southern rockers The Allman Brothers Band and, er, Limp Bizkit – Yuno perhaps wisely found his path to music through skateboarding and from playing the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater games. It might not be apparent at first listen, but those hours spent collecting, grabbing, grinding and flipping to a solid soundtrack of punk, metal and hip-hop have obviously paid off.

Firstly, it’s a solitary pursuit, which has translated well into an entirely independent work ethic – he’s a self-taught bedroom producer whose output, from beats and guitars through to press photos and promo videos, is all his own. Secondly, his music is packed with special sonic moves and a refreshingly wilful disregard for genre. As he told Pigeons and Planes, since his last release he’s been “Figuring out ways to make different styles of music, but still sound like myself”.

What’s resulted is a mini-album which succeeds in whetting the appetite for further fruit from his new deal with Sub Pop, if not entirely. ‘Amber’ and ‘No Going Back’ open. The first uses a big, dubby soundscape of bass and skittering drums, along with telephone snippets of maternal encouragement, to shade a song about finding a place of comfort, (stacked “with fruit and chips when I come around”), while the latter effortlessly nails what that last, massively disappointing Tame Impala album was edging towards.

Despite the finality of the lyrics, there’s an attractively easy-going, sunny vibe which is quickly broken by the gentle, sleepy-sounding shuffle of ‘Fall In Love’. Next, ‘Why For’ might be the peak, with echoing, anguished vocals and slabs of processed, fuzzy guitar over the skittering beats, and the kind of wordless cry of a chorus that finds a home in a festival crowd. Rob Mesure