11ai - Leapyear Register

Ilai Gilbert's first self-released full-length in four years wears its influences on its sleeve without ever feeling like a nostalgia exercise. Leapyear Register draws from the golden-era toolkit of house, IDM, drum & bass, ambient, and electro-pop, but runs all of it through 11ai's own filter: harmonically dense, a little off-kilter, built with the dancer and the headphone listener both in mind.

The eleven-track sequence moves in bursts rather than along a single arc. Interludes like Flat (1:16) and Daylight Funk (1:21) act as connective tissue between the record's meatier statements - Link Step stretches out to 5:35, giving the album's longest cut the most room to develop, while Contrate (4:05) and Are You Love? (4:23) sit as its other two centres of gravity. That contrast between quick sketches and fuller pieces is part of what gives the tracklist its shape: it never settles into one mode for long enough to grow predictable.

The first five tracks will likely appeal to fans of Logic1000 and Haai, with Moon in particular sending me back to Ikonika and even Hashim, given its nods to electro and early bass music. That Song flips the script entirely, steering the record into more electro-pop waters. Are You Love? carries those same electro-pop elements but trades a traditional vocal for a guitar line, with soft, ethereal pads filling out the rest of the palette. Daylight Funk wouldn't sound out of place as an interlude on something Kieran Hebden might put out.

Link Step, the release's longest offering, treads a similar line of electro-pop/funk while still being a track that could easily get feet moving at a house party. By the time Daylight arrives the BPM has shifted upwards, tipping into some delightfully skippy drum & bass territory that wound me straight back to the mid-to-late '90s. Take Off returns things to a more settled 4/4 rhythm, its bassline work and lovely key stabs making for a proper head-nodder (if that's not already a term, it should be).

The closer - and my personal favourite - Leapyear is a beautiful slice of IDM/glitch, weaving syncopated percussion, mournful pads and keys, and an arpeggiated lead into a wonderful way to see out what is a very enjoyable LP.

Leapyear Register is out now as a digital album or on CD in a clear jewel case, via Bandcamp.