The Comet Is Coming – Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam

The Comet Is Coming are back with their third full-length album, the aptly titled Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam. Picking up where they left off in 2019, Hyper-Dimensional... is bass-laden and synthesised, with shimmering inverted pedals that set the stage for extraterrestrial adventures in jazz. What’s new for 2022 is the distinct infusion of noughties dance beats – some tracks have lines that wouldn’t sound out of place at a dubstep night, and you can certainly imagine Katy B laying down vocals over PYRAMIDS. In some ways it’s a natural step – the chromatic movements of that era of dance music are straight out of the jazz scale book after all.

Hyper-Dimensional... marks Comet’s first outing without a featured spoken word artist (Joshua Idehen and Kae Tempest having graced their previous two albums), which makes sense given the move towards a dance-focused sound. To make way for this emerging sound, there are more moments where the album feels driven by synths rather than drums. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the trio shine most brightly when this is reversed; the incessant drumming on the closer MYSTIK charges the entire track with the feeling of take-off. Increased electronic sound is no bad thing, but we want to hear it used in the original and unexpected way we’ve by now come to expect from the band.

Listen to: CODE, FREQUENCY OF FEELING EXPANSION, MYSTIK