PAlMBOMeN ii

Memories Of CindyBeATS iN SPACe 6/10

New Age acolyte’s sprawling lo-fi house fantasia

A young Dutch hippy living in California, Kai Hugo’s last album as Palmbomen II took inspiration from ’90s sci-fi series The X Files, with each track of saturated disco named after a minor character. Memories Of Cindy is more ambitious – this 22-track, 2CD set rounds up his four episodic EPs for New York’s Beats In Space label – but Hugo’s bleachedout, straight-to-video aesthetic remains as he conjures a fuzzy 1980s portal for his otherworldly muse. Hugo wades through three types of jam: deep-vein acid squidge, smoky synth drone and hazy dungeon house laced with angelic vocals. With so much of the same thing, these Memories… are intensely vague and vaguely intense.