Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith & Joe Goddard
Neptunes
DOMINO/SMUGGLERS WAY
Electronic composer and producer Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Hot Chip’s Joe Goddard made initial waves in the electronic and dance realms earlier this year with the hard-charging title track from their booming space-themed EP Neptunes, where they aimed to pay homage to Chad Hugo and Pharrell Williams’ influential production partnership of the same name. Beyond “Neptunes,” which ranges from science-class synthesizers to clattering percussion as it builds itself up over five minutes, the four additional tracks on the compact new release include Goddard’s “Rapid Fire,” Smith’s “Around You,” and both artists’ remixes of each other’s solo contributions. Each track has a unique rhythmic texture, but the constant theme is a wall of bass that transports you to a celestial space.
Smith has been producing since the age of 14, making it her professional trade by her mid-twenties. Her way of approaching electronic music feels more like a film score—which makes sense, given that her original mentorship came from a film composer, in addition to citing film music as a primary influence. Waves of alien synthesizers and mumbling vocals shake hands with distortion effects in her recordings, which complement her longtime friend Goddard and his love for modular-synth dance music. The beat-driven sound collages use a strange array of gear, including a Buchla 200e (also used by deadmau5), the funky Buchla Music Easel, Wasp synth, and Abelton, in addition to Smith’s elastic voice. On the other side, Goddard has his typical drum samples, an Omnisphere synth, and loads of Culture Vulture harmonic distortion.
Overall, it’s a spritely release that keeps the listener engaged, and even the two remixes are different enough from the tempos of the originals to keep the excitement and BPM levels high enough to finish strong. Both artists value the stranger sides of European synthesizer music, which makes Neptunes a robust appetizer. It would be interesting to see what Goddard and Smith could pull off on a full album with this type of arrangement where they set up grooves individually and then quickly dismantle them with infectious dance remixes.
