Two Shell - Two Shell

Even those who’ve touched grass within the last decade will find it requires putting a lot of cynicism aside not to roll eyes at the idea of another enigmatic artist ‘playfully’ hiding their identity. In short, it’s just as well ‘Two Shell’ is as good as it is. Somewhere between cut-and-paste, and the sound of an hour’s daytime radio pop sliced into tiny pieces to be reconstructed, familiar sounds sit disconcertingly alongside jarring repetition, while the mood veers from cult underground club to overpriced East London designer boutique. Like a post-PC Music Jamie xx, skittish beats intersperse slick pop moments, such as on the hip hop indebted ‘(rock✧solid)’, the (relatively) subtle ‘dreamcast’, or ‘Stars..’, which crams pop, hyperpop, drum’n’bass, and the recent UK Garage revival sound into a sub-four-minute track which also provides one of the record’s cleanest pop moments. It’s a club record, no doubt: ‘come to terms’ and especially ‘Everybody Worldwide’ sit on the radio-friendly side, while ‘₊˚⊹gimmi it’ lands on the other end of the spectrum. The oddest moment, though, is reserved for ‘be somebody’ - a banger whose titular hook bears unexpected similarity to Kings of Leon’s 2008 hit, ‘Use Somebody’. A sonic journey, and a consistently interesting one at that, which never threatens to become inaccessible: ‘Two Shell’ can’t fail to be a winner.