Free Love – INSIDE
Glasgow duo Free Love return with another collection of woozy synth soundscapes and acid techno
Free Love are one of Scotland’s most exciting bands, because you never quite know what Suzi and Lewis Cook are going to do next. Their music alternates between transcendent soundscapes and acid bangers fit to start a rave in an empty phone box. Suzi’s vocals are forceful and direct, with enough coquettish asides en français to make you rethink your ambivalence to the Duolingo owl.
It’s a pattern that continues on INSIDE, where the buzzes and crunches of acid techno sit alongside woozy drones and shimmering resonances. Open the Door is pushed on by a thumping click-clack of a beat, while Dans Le Noir is one of Free Love’s best songs yet. It’s a funky, sleazy dance track laden with drum samples and a fabulously squelchy bassline that Zapp! or Parliament would be proud of.
At the more ethereal end, Don’t Stop and Stop make for a woozy two-parter full of warm droning tones, while I Become is a transcendent, sun-blushed synth jam. Yet INSIDE's high point sits outside the usual Free Love dynamic. Golden Goose is built around a scratchy, minimal loop, but it builds, and builds, with big washes of synth and looping, blown-out vocals. Evidently, Scotland’s premier electronic synth-pop and guided meditation duo still have plenty of surprises up their sleeves.
Listen to: Dans Le Noir, Golden Goose, Open the Door