Bleep

When they emerged towards the end of the 2000s, Little Dragon’s music - synthetic, soulful and mysterious - allowed them to forge their own path away from the trends of the time. Now, well over a decade after the early releases, Little Dragon are the trend, with whole scenes springing up in imitation of their sound. On their new LP New Me, Same Us the Swedish quartet return to prove that there are still few who can do this style of music quite as well as they can.

Ebullient, classy and effortlessly cool, New Me, Same Us contains some of Little Dragon’s crispest pop tunes to date. Tracks like ‘Hold On’ and ‘Are You Feeling Sad?’ are Classic Little Dragon affairs, combining evocative keyboards with snappy funk rhythms to delightful effect. The band also remind us of their range here: ‘Another Lover’ is the sort of sleek neo-soul jam that Thundercat has stamped his name on these past few years; ‘New Fiction’ falls into one of Tame Impala’s dreamy reveries; there is some 90s R ‘n’ B to ‘Where You Belong’; closer ‘Water’ is an impressionistic ambient-pop nugget pitched halfway between shoegaze and chillwave. Throughout all of this Yukimi Nagano remains a charismatic presence upfront, her vocals knitting the whole affair together.

On their first album in three years, Little Dragon are older and wiser but still doing what they do with style and aplomb - this is New Me, Same Us.