For Those I Love

Dublin producer’s vivid homage to best friend.

When his Burnt Out bandmate Paul Curran took his own life in 2018, David Balfe re-routed the long-playing ode to friendship he’d been working on. While the loss of innocence central to Birthday/ The Pain and Top Scheme hit hard against the backdrop of post-austerity Dublin, it’s Curran’s all-consuming grief that cuts deepest on halfrapped tracks as resonant as The Streets, candid as early Arab Strap and viscerally poetic as A House. Yet the music is far from mournful – looped, invigorating, acidic electronica evoking illegal raves, Mount Kimbie and Kanye West’s chipmunk soul, frugging through the pain with nimble sample flicks of Smokey Robinson and snippets of Curran’s laughter saved from WhatsApp. Haunted and intimate, Balfe’s deep brogue ultimately salvages hope from the wreckage.