Album Review: Flume - Flume

Since dropping his track, Sleepless, earlier this year, Flume (aka Harley Streten) has been all any music lover has talked (or blogged) about. A fresh vision of electronic hip hop, Sleepless embodied the talent and insight of a producer far beyond Streten's 21 years and left everyone waiting for the big debut to drop.

And boy he did not disappoint. In his self-titled debut, Flume has embraced the methodology within Sleepless, focusing on attractive beats and manipulating vocals and other instrumentals accordingly, to create a sensational, genre-bending 50 minutes of beautifully produced electronic music. From the synth-splattered, glitch beats of opener, Sintra, to the soulful prods of Holdin On, it's clear that Flume has created a completely unique and accessible electronic album. Blending Chet Faker's raspy vocals with his own electronic bleeps on Left Alone, and then just as effortlessly warping the vocals of Moon Holiday on Insane to create an eerily beautiful, synth-swept tune, there just doesn't seem like there is much Flume can't do as a producer.

Getting a little aggressive with his beats and perfectly punctuating rapper T.Shirt's vocals on On Top, Flume really lets loose and demonstrates just how comfortable he is working within the hip hop genre, balancing the highs and lows of the song like a pro, and with a great ear for the necessary punctuations and crashes within the song to make it really come to life.

With a great balance between stimulating technique and mainstream appeal, and because it is just that freaking good, this album is going to help develop a whole new wave of fans to the electronic genre. For anyone to deliver an album of this quality would be impressive, but for a 21-year-old to drop this as his debut? Freaking wunderkind.