GEORGE FITZGERALD
Stellar Drifting (Domino)
For his third album under his own name, George FitzGerald walks the thin tightrope between club classics and ambient soundscapes. With guest appearances from Panda Bear, Soak and London Grammar, Stellar Drifting lives up to its starry title as the music shifts between songs for getting up on the dancefloor or lying down on the sofa.
Lead single Cold’s restless beat invites movement but longer tracks like Setting Sun are real floor fillers. Retina Flash is more along the line of Brian Eno’s Music For Airports, with much of William Orbit’s turn-of-the-century palettes updated for a modern audience.
The whole of Stellar Drifting seems to build toward the penultimate track. The Last Transmission is a perfect synthesis of the album’s well-varied electronic elements and features a haunting and moving vocal from London Grammar’s Hannah Reid, while closer Ultraviolet is a lesson in the power of minimalist loops that shows how developed FitzGerald’s individual style has become.
words JOHN-PAUL DAVIES