Spacious but far from sparse, "Fear of the Forest" is the second album from Brooklyn musician Gabriel Cyr under his Teleseen moniker. Operating at the meeting point between electronic music, dub and reggae, Cyr's second release tries hard to distance itself from the generic dubstep ghetto, and almost succeeds. While most mainstream dub-flavoured electronica doesn’t do it for me, I am not impervious to the style itself, or the work of those who operate at its edges and embrace ideas rather than aesthetics, as Cyr does here, but not always with success.
In places, this album makes clever, sparing use of vocalists, combining them with ear-catching percussive elements, worldly samples and lots of echo. Songs such as "Crown" and "Black Monday" are particularly good examples of how to integrate vocalists into a deep and dubby music. However "Chikurubi" feels tired and jaded with its boring, unnecessary rap, and "Factions" doesn't work for the exact reasons why "Black Monday" does: the vocals are far from subtle, and feel tacked on. "Wind Unification" sounds like Gotan Project gone dubby until things take a distinctly weird turn two thirds of the way in, which makes it the highlight of the album for me. Lots to like on “Fear of the Forest”, but unfortunately, quite a bit not to like. Perhaps Cyr was trying to please too many people. My suggestion: drop the rappers.
TEXT: GARETH OWEN
electronic beats
Teleseen
Fear of the Forest
Percepts
dub
dubstep
Gotan Project
Gabriel Cyr