Gutevolk
Twinkle

THE REVIEW

Putting on a coat in summer and stepping into autumnal, sometimes icy atmospheres is not easy. 

But this is the ethereal and eternally crystallized style of Hirono Nishiyama, stage name: Gutevolk. This little Japanese composer left planet Earth several years ago, to find a permanent residence within an electro-glitch-pop that never exceeds 20 degrees Celsius. The album in question is a small great essay of nostalgia, a tear that falls amidst bitter smiles and a future not as bleak as it seems. Twinkle Star's Cycling Bolero immediately creates a rare addiction for a track, and Gutevolk's vision for this ancient English lullaby is both intangible and solid, in a succession of sounds and atmospheres that blend perfectly with the singing. Once the first track is digested, Light Parade brings your gaze to the ground, as a thousand raindrops begin to fall. Sweet and never intrusive sounds, despite the obsessive central melody, truly touch the string of melancholy, a feeling that Gutevolk always analyzes and reproduces to perfection. Track number three, and our mind is now with the windmills, among timeless smiles and cheer. After a moment of tension, beautifully handled, Little Girl, Little Star returns to explode with all its incorporeal nature, making you close your eyes. And this is exactly the role that little Hirono plays: creating small parallel worlds where the sky is made of papier-mâché and the Moon is within a jump's reach. You will realize that the journey of Twinkle is an experience capable of making you stop whatever you were doing to shut yourself away in the unexplored universe of your thoughts. All this while Hirono's sweet and perfectly enunciated voice melds seamlessly with the notes of Silo, telling us another fairy tale. Moonlaker instead seems to almost announce the impending end of the album, in a minute and twenty-four perfectly motionless seconds inside a crystal cave. And it is with Wondering that Gutevolk bids us farewell, selecting fascinating strings that embrace more electronic and gritty sounds, only to return to their original form to ferry us, like Charon, to the epilogue.

The magic fades away.

Repeat.