areyetee - dejected gaze

I’m in awe of this shit. Over the past few years areyetee has paved their own lane in the instrumental space, linking with heavyweight greats like aerate and coldplushtoy under various monikers, and having some of the finest moments on compilation tapes like their two soulcrushing beats on this year’s cakefromhellworldtour. But it’s in a tape like dejected gaze that it seems their vision is fully captured in all its noisy and beautiful glory. The whole tape plays out like a really vast open-world game OST, gliding through various nocturnal pockets of the map at hyperspeed, every serene vocal and entrancing drone lulling you deeper into a world completely unlike our own. I don’t want to get too technical, but I feel areyetee’s drum patterns are one of one, and I can only imagine them being played like Chris Cunningham’s Monkey Drummer if it took a gram of cocaine. These drums are the guiding force that drives each beat to transcendent heights, every abrasive hihat and snare like they’re played at a breakneck pace in real time. Matched with a sample like ‘shell’ which could’ve landed on Fan-Tas-tic Vol 2, it’s an amazingly engaging and earwormy effect. areyetee only seems to be getting better with every release, honing in on their sound to deliver really unique projects that stand out even during such an incredible time for beat tapes. Highly recommend copping this on bandcamp too, because the chikyujin tape has some of the best work here.

KEY BEAT: my eternal presence - hard for this not to be my favourite after seeing mmrywvr’s incredible visual that accompanied it, but with the deep echoing ambience of the sample paired up with perfectly-placed metallic percussion, it’s not hard to see how masterful areyetee is with this.