Bleep

Randy Newman, Harry Nilsson, George Harrison — A. G. Cook doesn’t really sound like any of these. But we can’t deny that there’s a certain classic pop panache mixed with world-weariness to his Apple LP. A. G. Cook invokes the masters with the perfect bait-and-switch of ‘Oh Yeah’, which begins with his blemished vocal delivering beautifully simple couplets atop an acoustic guitar strum, later blossoming into synthesised life with choral keys and a crisp boom-bap.

Prerequisite to anything A. G. Cook releases — be it material of his own or the impressive roster of boundary-pushing artists on his PC Music imprint — is the transformative use of autotune, its potential unlocked as an emotive tool for adding uncanny textures to lyrical sentiments. Outside of scalding hot noise-club bangers like ‘Xxoplex’ and ‘Airhead’, Cook demonstrates the same meticulous attention to detail on the sparse folk number ‘Haunted’, which brings to mind a Neil Young software update. The song is lavished in a sense of earnestness later felt in the baroque synth ode ‘Animals’, Cook’s tribute to another hero, Oneohtrix Point Never. Other spots on the record are utterly resplendent, coming to a head with the pseudo-soft rock coda ‘Lifeline’, as fitting a closer as any end credits tune in a 1980s high school movie.

As is customary to any PC Music release, A. G. Cook’s Apple is full of surprises, equally imbued with crushing noise and classy pop sheen, often within the same song.