Swisher

It’s something you can really sink your teeth into--and derive pleasure from its airy and light techno journey into the skull.

Tracks regularly clock in at eight, nine and 10 minutes, yet Blondes never outstay their welcome.

That feeling of organic growth and decay is, definitively, what makes Blondes unique--everything is in its right place, but instead of processed-to-death perfection, it just feels natural.

It is one of the better EDM records in recent years due to its well-mired quality, and it feels neither trendy nor throwbacky nor settled.

Though the songs on Swisher are occasionally a little too long--even the shortest is more than five minutes, and ‘Andrew’ nearly 10--they’re mostly dynamic and varied enough that boredom never really has the chance to set in.

Swisher may not be as immediate as Blondes was, but these ambitious, accomplished tracks offer ample proof that restraint can be exciting.

Some may complain that Blondes hasn't radically expanded its horizons on Swisher, but frankly, such an effort isn't even necessary, as there's still fresh ground to cover within the confines of the duo's engrossing signature style.

As with many dance LPs, Swisher is slightly on the long side--65 minutes is more than enough time to get your groove on. But the album never ends up sounding repetitive, the emotions behind the beats don’t allow it to.

The emphasis is on soft, kinetic beats, with melodies pulled out of unpromising materials--discordant synths, laser pulses--and it’s one whacking great testament to what dance music can do with a bit of imagination.

Follow-up Swisher doesn’t abandon the beauty of the duo’s earlier work (“Andrew” and “Rei” could easily be lifted from last year’s album) but it uses it more judiciously. This shift makes Swisher less immediately captivating but somehow more involving than its predecessor, establishing the ultimate core of the duo’s aesthetic somewhere deeper and altogether more mysterious.

By the end of some heavy listening, you understand that they’ve found something more beautiful still, all the more so because it is hard won, but just as they’ve had to work to find it, so must we.