Space People - Wet |

Gotham-based beat scientist Space People returns to Styles Upon Styles with Wet, the long-awaited follow-up to last year’s debut, SHMM. From the neck-snapping wobble of “East” to the clap-that-ass insistence of “Work,” Wet finds Space People combining a postTimbaland, found-sound futurism with a powerful helping of gridless, hard-swinging cosmic slop. But here, a hard ear for the weird doesn’t mean a lean towards the tedious, as is often the case: the six-track set clocks in at just shy of 16 minutes, a refreshing bid for concise length and split-second motivic development in an age in which the ocean’s motion is often all but an afterthought. Wet succeeds as a work both succinct and expressive, tending as much towards the psychic as the overtly sexual, and uniting the two in a humid orgy of avant-garde boom-bap and boogie bass. A capable multi-instrumentalist and native New Yorker, Space People builds frenetic, funk-laden tracks using digital and analog synthesizers, drum machines, and an expansive sample library. His work showcases a sound that is just as likely to recall Charles Stepney’s cinematic arranging or Giorgio Moroder’s harmonic palette, as it is J Dilla’s poltergeist trying to skype you through your home appliances. His career as a collaborator has been unusually fruitful. He’s maintained a decade-long partnership with songwriter Gabriel Garzón-Montano with several releases to date, most recently the official remix of Mayer Hawthorne’s “Lingerie & Candlewax.” He has garnered critical acclaim for his production work on Chi’ren, the 2016 EP from fellow Styles artists Quincy Vidal, and remains an indispensable part of their live performances. Most recently, he served as music director for the debut live performance of Latasha Alcindor’s B(LA)K at National Sawdust. The visual components to Wet - both the album design and the title track’s accompanying video - were carefully crafted by longtime Styles colla