Letherette - EP5

June 8, 2018 - Wulf Records

Wulf Records, or Letherette, has released another one of its own creations. EP5, which is an LP if you ask me, and in essence you are asking me, is a playful comeback from EP4. Turning their attention away from the dance floor and towards a downtempo fuck session, Letherette has built into EP5 a lot of the charm and less of the hooks from their earlier classics like ‘In July Focus’ or ‘Cherryade.’ Juicy Easy Listening For Moderates—This genre will apply in the future once moderates look a little less conservative and are less easily bought out. So fifteen years until the alignment of this new slick set of anthems-for-the-moderates and the moderates themselves. Fingers crossed Letherette keeps producing, lest such political figures have more quiet time for ennui. 

With the knowledge that our country’s leader is hot on his way to appointing a new member of the Supreme Court, let’s take a closer look at track one and postpone for a moment the terrible reality. ‘Love Lust’ which opens and closes the album, features in its first iteration Olivier St Louis. The artist was on a self-described hiatus from performing feature vocals in favor of finding his own musical voice. But now he’s not on hiatus. So Letherette got him to sing and rap a little. As F. Scott Fitzgerald would put it, his voice is full of money. The thing which We Hate Music trusts very little, but enjoys very much. Both for its intrinsic abilities to provide joy and for its secondary quality that is flaunting it in front of our interns. 

In his only appearance, Olivier enumerates the things that thwart him, one of which is the smell of a lady “The way you smell, It’s killin’ me” and another of which is that he can’t identify his own emotions and needs his lover to tell him about his own feelings. “Is this love?” It’s tautologically gamy—not a lot of reward in the lyricism, but again, this is a fuck session. But the barrenness of the lyrics strips any intimacy or nuance from whatever sex might be had. It’s a weak open, but with the instrumental finish it provides what I was taught to appreciate as “circularity.”

I’m going to skip track two in favor of talking about track three which is not as good as track two. Haha. Onto track four, ‘Pal Mal.’ If you’re going to enjoy this track on iTunes, you may notice this album is classified under Hip-Hop/Rap. That’s because Olivier sings bland words about love and in ‘Pal Mal;’ there’s a cut in of a swag-rich “Yuh” every couple of bars. Highly reverbed Hispanic chatter tickles the ear in the initial seconds, followed by a light samba, which is becoming a popular trend in upcoming electronica. The track has a hard time staying put. About midway through, the beat breaks for a second time and drops its energy in favor of a laid back nostalgia for some of their earlier arrangements. Lazy pianos, a confident slow-ass beat, spliced in cut-outs: bingo.

‘Pianto’ earns the album its hip-hop classification. Classical piano samples and generalized hip-hop beats conjoin in an at-times jazzy arrangement. Again, without some of the more punching hooks in their previous work, the track is pleasant, though easily left alone. Each song is loop and layer heavy. Occasionally the duo provides false-conclusion or matter-of-fact transitions, opting for the fade-out. Indeed, EP5 is a production content to let its ideas peter out. My primary dig is: perhaps Letherette should take some more time with the quiet within to produce something where the intention is not a tail-chase search for the listener. Letherette has made what could’ve been a Sound Oasis into a Hookless Desert. No hooks. I know they can do hooks. I have heard wonderful hooks from them.

Should the duo persist, it’s exciting to think that this Letherette has another fifteen years to hone their craft so that future moderates can experience something truly moving, and perhaps in their inspired and comforted states come to conclusions rather than peter out. ⛰️