Lemmings Suicide Myth – Lemmings Suicide Myth

The Music

The Words

As I was preparing to close off this week’s release amalgam, I stumbled upon this intriguing cover art in the jazz section of bandcamp’s discovery tool. After a few seconds of the featured song playing, I was sold. I opened the album page and bought it, and, minutes before the scheduled publication, included it in my weekly post.

So, what’s this album that made it by the skin of its teeth into my week? Lemmings Suicide Myth‘s second self-titled album. Based off of Tarot cards, this jazz fusion drums and piano duo is able to conjure quasi-hallucinogenic sonic landscapes into our mind’s eye, simply with their music. Thanks to a wide choice of harmonies, modulations, and rhythms, the two lemmings create an intricate and deeply layered sound that speaks a lot more than even most progressive music out there.

The rhythms sometimes veer close to Tigran Hamasyan’s renowned syncopated style, but this is not the only point of focus of Lemmings Suicide Myth. Their songs have complicated structures that use many different sections in rapid succession, and the sections themselves are almost never repeated as-is, and instead receive a development on every iteration. The work of Benjamin Bentz on the piano is rather phenomenal, too, as is the ceaseless and never static groove of Philippe Isenmann. The addition of glockenspiel to the music seems benign, but I feel like it truly adds to the experience and otherwise quite limited variety of sounds present on record.

Go ahead and download the album for free, or support the band by dropping something their way if you can. This is a really good album and a rare treat!

The Links

Bandcamp
Facebook

The Recs

Pivixki
Matt Mitchell
Anomalie