East India Youth – Culture Of Volume
- Written by Amy Finlayson
Culture Of Volume opens with an electronic interference that metamorphoses into a tune: ‘The Juddering’ does just that, to continue the Kafka reference, it crawls inside you then begins to buzz and flutter its wings and grow until your whole body is reverberating and alive.
And that’s what William Doyle, aka East India Youth, does to the listener, he somehow places electronic music inside you and makes you feel it. He takes it out of the domain of the faceless producer and gives it heart. With his first album, Total Strife Forever he took electronic music to a new place. A largely instrumental album, it flies around, lifting you to the clouds and then letting you descend with the raindrops, melting into the landscape. The follow-up, Culture of Volume does not disappoint.
Although the first album was largely instrumental, the balance of this one is in favour of songs – which is no bad thing as Doyle’s beautiful boy-like vocals only open up more of an emotive response. His lyrics take you on a passionate and for the most part melancholy journey as in the single ‘Turn Away’:
“Crush the life, I think that I've had enough/Contemplating, digging holes for my love”
And in the epic ten minute journey that is ‘Manner of Words’ the bleakness of the world is projected:
“In the face of the earth/In a manner of words/All reasons to breathe/All reasons to see/They are gone away from me”
But there are moments of euphoria, such as in ‘Hearts That Never’, more musically than in the lyrics, as you are left wondering if “hearts that never let you go” is a good thing or not. But the song consists of fast-paced electronica that bursts around you like fireworks.
Then there is the immersive sweeping cinematic joy that is ‘Carousel’. Interestingly it comes straight after ‘Entirety’, a wonderfully dirty industrial techno tune that fades out so you are left with a moment’s quiet before ‘Carousel’ blows your mind. It makes you feel as though your place in the universe is both insignificant and important. And that sums up how East India Youth makes you feel with his music - it is simultaneously uplifting and humbling – a carousel of emotions.