Title: Hotel Solaris
Artist: Longhair
Label: Permanent Vacation
Cat Number: PERMVAC242-1
Genre: Disco
1: Monday Funday
2: Sponge Bob
3: Planets & Orbits
4: Pixie Crop
5: Feathered Flip
6: Telemark
7: Angry Professor
8: Techno Power
‘Hotel Solaris’ is the conceptual name of a real hotel that “stands as an escape symbol from the real world”, something that many of us were compelled into imagining during the pandemic. However, while the world’s events do nothing to quell a desire to get away from it all, there must, I suppose, be a cut off point where for better or worse, reality prevails. This album soundtracks the conviction that such a place could exist and goes full pelt into assuaging any guilt whatsoever that could emerge from this escapism. Both ‘Monday Funday’ and ‘Sponge Bob’ are breezy, uptempo tunes that exude sunshine and relaxation, and borrow African pop guitar licks and strident optimism respectively. ‘Planets and Orbits’, the first single, is a bit more out there and uses effect-laden spoken word as an added layer to an already densely constructed disco synth monster. Tonally, the album reminds me a lot of ‘Nepotik’ by Uj Pa Gaz which was released on Tici Taci almost two years ago, a work of uptempo sunny disco that was more than the sum of its parts. Tracks like ‘Pixie Crop’ and ‘Feathered Flip’ serve to reinforce this, while ‘Angry Professor’ sees a pressure drop into dub, in contrast to ‘Techno Power’ which isn’t particularly extreme, but is as full on as it gets here.
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