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You are here: Home / Culture / Music / Albums / GOLD: melancholic synthpop at its most nostalgic from RIKI

GOLD: melancholic synthpop at its most nostalgic from RIKI

December 17, 2021 Category: Albums, Reviews
Riki - Gold
Riki
Riki - Gold
Riki – Gold

RIKI

Gold (Dais)

On Gold, the second album from Riki, the self-identifying New Romantic leaves behind the darkwave of her debut for super slick synth-pop that is heavily indebted to the Eighties aesthetic. We’re talking fretless bass, the occasional honking sax solo, and that plinky bell sound as heard on Ghosts by Japan. And gated snares. Everywhere.

RELATED: ‘Fans nostalgic for the heady days of Dare (now 40) and Human League hits like Don’t You Want Me filled the Motorpoint in Cardiff.’

In fact, most of the songs veer between homage and pastiche, with even Riki’s vocal style aping early Madonna, Bananarama, and Sade on different tracks. The only time we leave the 80s is on It’s No Secret, which takes on the dubby pop sound of the mid-90s – while Marigold, featuring album producer Joshua Eustis of Telefon Tel Aviv, suggests chillwave might be on its way back already.

For all the gloss, Gold is an album underpinned by a sense of melancholia or maybe numbness that at times feels like an exercise in parody, were it not for the strength of some of the songs here.

words SAM EASTERBROOK

KEEP READING: ‘Future versions of Cyrano are unlikely to have a soundtrack as seductive and slick as what The National’s Dessner brothers have created.’

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About Noel Gardner

Noel is the listings, reviews, music and books editor at Buzz and has been doing some or all of these things here since the days of dial-up internet. He was raised in Cornwall, lives in Cardiff and that is more or less all he has ever known.
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Tag: buzz album review, dais records, riki, sam easterbrook, telefon tel aviv

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