After quietly releasing his own brand of elegant house music for a few years, Leif Knowles was catapulted into the spotlight last year on the back of his excellent debut album Dinas Oleu. A spellbinding set of lush and atmospheric tracks, the album rightly made its way onto numerous end-of-year lists and highlighted a producer with a knack for creating music perfect for both home listening and the sets of more adventurous DJs.
His latest release comes courtesy of the Bristol staple Idle Hands and continues the run of form. Eschewing regular four-to-the-floor drums, the tracks on Life Through Analogies take up more fractured rhythmic structures and dubby sounds whilst still having that signature moody feel. Whilst the title track will probably gain most traction with DJs and ‘Salix’ nicely closes the EP with dubbed-out synths and vocal snippets, the pick of the bunch has to be the gorgeous centrepiece ‘My Heart Stopped Beating’. The track is a delightfully washed-out affair that pairs a looped vocal with downcast piano chords, all filtered through an end-of-the-night haze. Drums shuffle away in the background whilst delicate synth sounds and waves of tape hiss wash overhead, giving the track a refreshingly organic feel.
Leif’s Life Through Analogies is available to buy now locally at Idle Hands and online via Juno.