Album Review Yves Tumor - Praise A Lord Who Chews But Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds)

Much like its elongated and frankly bemusing title, ‘Praise a Lord…’ is a reflection of Yves Tumor’s unknowing. Chewing on the words “There’s parts of me I still don’t even know” on breakthrough single ‘God Is A Circle’, it’s apparent that Yves inhabits a spectral plane, one that eschews them from simple, throwaway labels. The shrewd pop outsider has long fluctuated between power pop, trip hop and glam metal, but on ‘Praise A Lord…’ they flip the script, reinventing themself as a songwriter by stripping back their usually swelling instrumental cushion and incorporating Americana (’Meteora Blues’), post-punk (’Operator’) and far more comprehensible lyrics than those on 2021’s ‘The Asymptomatical World’. Their blunt, affecting lyrics on ‘Praise A Lord…’ separates them from other leftfield pop acts, somehow creating grounding, brutal love songs amid the flurry of dance-pop and industrial noise. Over the last half-decade, Yves has carved out their own, trailblazing sound amid the racket of modernity and it truly feels like an awakening. Trapped somewhere between visceral punk, Oneohtrix Point Never and Dean Blunt, ‘Praise A Lord…’ is in fact like no other.