Credit: Kannibalen
The Fae - YMIR
Genre: Miscellaneous
In short: "a fantasy book, but in music"
Credit: Kannibalen
Genre: Miscellaneous
In short: "a fantasy book, but in music"
Rating: 100
Cohesiveness: 100
Track quality: 89
Tags:
Beginner-friendly? should be okay?
The good: Stirred in with a strong fantasy narrative and a beautiful self-sung vocal performance in each track, YMIR's production is diverse and consistent. His ideas are fantastic, his execution is flawless; I mean, what more could you want? The answer is, apparantely, a lot more, and yet "The Fae" just keeps on giving. Whether it's the cinematic nature of "The Tower", the gritty "Fatal Faith" or the ominous "The Garden, The Fountain", YMIR showcases his talent as a very well-rounded artist, mixing his signature elements of dark rock, pop and bass into alternative genres like breakbeat and even neurofunk, placing his own twist on each one with generous helpings of distortion and personal emotion. And his vocal — to reiterate, self-sung — is phenomenal, being impactful and interacting with the lyricism in a very polished manner, mixed in well with the beats for maximum effect. It really does feel like YMIR has left no loose trails, no evidence of poor production choices or awkward moments, leaving behind a record that only exists in its absolute form, in its ultimately polished form. And, lest we forget, the fantasy narrative of "The Fae" is better than the majority of LPs out there, feeling cohesive and polished and spine-chillingly good.
The bad: Quite literally nothing bad about this one. That's why it's 100/100, I suppose.
| Name | Comments | Superlative |
|---|---|---|
| The Tower | Long, vocal-heavy first movement that develops, darkens, evolves into a final heavier drop; crazy progression | Standout |
| The Wild Hunt | Plucky and majestic with highly impactful vocals and mixing, with prominent leads and great lyricism | Intense |
| Fatal Faith | A more melancholic track with driven, gritty neurofunk drop and some very neat effects | Switchup |
| Ambrosia | Dramatic and distorted, with more energy, neat vocal chops and powerful metaphorical lyrics about addiction | Melodic |
| The Fae | Slow, piano-driven interlude with a lot of atmosphere, that does well to encapsulate the fantasy ideas | Structural |
| The Garden, The Fountain | The perfect finale — ominous, atmospheric, brooding, with powerful ritualistic vocals in front of a frantic breakbeat | Dark |