MUSIC FOR PSYCHEDELIC THERAPY: beautiful, authentic ambience from JON HOPKINS

JON HOPKINS

Music For Psychedelic Therapy (Domino)

You may be able to tell from the title of Music For Psychedelic Therapy – the latest album from Jon Hopkins – that we’re not in the verse-chorus three-minute pop world. Nor is the album in the vein of the festival-ready techno bangers that first made Hopkins’ name – there’s nothing here to match the ever-brilliant Open Eye Signal from 2013’s Immunity for starters.

Instead, we’re deep into ambient territory with Music For Psychedelic Therapy, without a kick drum or beat of any kind to be found. Yet this feels like a natural progression for Jon Hopkins, whose contemporary classical and drone influences were always there bubbling away on previous albums. 

Now they’ve floated fully to the surface, all sparkling sheen and pretty synths, glassy textures and lost snatches of voice. And while it’s easy to mock ambient – just see the ‘night manager’ of Ghostly International’s Twitter account – or dismiss it as spa music, it can’t diminish Music For Psychedelic Therapy from being a simply beautiful album from Jon Hopkins.

words SAM EASTERBROOK