Reviewed by: Chano

Dorian Concept - The Nature of Imitation
This album is full of fun, upbeat, positive, and dynamic songs and beats; very funky grooves and very cool stuttering starts and stops throughout. Feels organic despite the super electronic vibe. Warm and nice. Play some of these jams and enjoy the vibes.

FCCs: none!
Favorites: 3, 6, 9, 11
RIYL: Daft Punk, Flying Lotus, Kamasi Washington, James Blake, D’Angelo

1. Promises - 3:57 - midtempo. jazzy introduction leads into funky atmospheric groove, then the heavily effected vocals come in and get matched by fuzzy synth leads and cool sounds all around. Lots of parts; Song sort of breaksdown at 3min in and then re-starts.
2. Angel Shark - 3:00 - frenetic start; start and stop energy with upbeat keys leading the way out of the chaos. Beat comes in at about 1min and the drums and bass are fuzzy but upbeat; effected vocals buried in background. Warm uplifting feel to this one.
3. J Buyers - 4:51 - this the single and it starts off with some dramatic synth sounds build up for about a minute and then upbeat midtempo keys come in before breaking into a very radio friendly beat with huge drum presence. Very dancey and positive vibe. Lots of start stop action like the other tracks but it feels more poppy and cohesive on this one.
4. A Mother’s Lament - 1:52 - introspective vibe throughout this short song; very pretty keys and warm bass line; little glitchy delay toward the end feels nice compared to the warm keys.
5. No Time Not Mine - 3:56 - more upbeat funky energy; start stop dynamics; funky breakdown and opening up of the beat about halfway through clears space for cosmic synth lead. Last min is lots of interesting sounds while the rest of the beat drops out.
6. Pedestrians - 3:56 - super funky boom bap drums; very nice tones; femme vocals come about 1min into song; This one has a futuristic R&B feel. Kind of reminds me of a song off of D’Angelo’s Black Messiah record. Very cool.
7. Self Similarity - 4:12 - beat builds up in funky way and then breaks down into warm sounds and fades out into piano 90 seconds in. Tension builds back up and then squelching synth and big drums back the piano up adding intensity to the melody. Chopped horn samples add great texture to the synths toward end of song. Long fade out of about 30 seconds.
8. Dishwater - 2:52 - slow build up with vibe of uncertainty; resolves into melancholy vibe before funky bass, drums, and synth tone coming in and adding a nice groove to the mix. Some of the chords feel similar to other songs, but the overall vibe feels slower and groovier even with lots of breakdowns and start/stop dynamics.
9. E13 - 4:43 - drums come in pretty quickly here and are midtempo and off kilter feeling. Nice vocal samples; about 50 seconds in the main chords pick up and a snare leads the way forward while the synth squeals. Meditative vibe gives way to consistent and steady motion forward. Resolves into an intense sounding ending and then cuts out a bunch of sounds and brings in some bleeps and bloops and chopped flute sounding samples. Very cool track.
10. The Space - 3:36 - 40 seconds of build up lead to more funky/jazzy synth action. Nothing new here compared to the other tracks but lots of positive vibes. Feels poppy - I could hear this on mainstream radio almost.
11. You Give And Give - 2:27 - really cool transition at 40 seconds and the vocals come in - femme/masc sounding; no drums for first half of song give this a different vibe; very intense build up and then the ground falls out and we get more pretty piano chords.