The Age of Aquarius

There have been a lot of releases in recent years by European acts incorporating Asian pop and even traditional instrumentation into their new albums, but to sometimes disappointing ends. YĪN YĪN’s 2019 release The Rabbit That Hunts Tigers struck a fine but successful balance between tribute and imitation, but their latest release on Glitterbeat Records loses some of that album’s tight focus. The instrumentation, either live or sequenced, references South-East and East Asia, but at times can seem slightly rote on this album, there to add colour to the club beats and electronics rather than functioning on their own.

A slower tempo track such as ‘Declined by Universe’ works better, using some Thai-sounding strings and flangey keyboards to create an atmospheric stew, but other songs suffer from pretty pedestrian sounding disco drums patterns that don’t really heat up enough, with the title-track an example of a song that doesn’t go anywhere after a dramatic set up. YĪN YĪN would undoubtedly be a great live band and I think they have more to share in the studio, but this album doesn’t really show their strengths.