Moon Diagrams Lifetime of Love

Moon Diagrams is the solo work of Deerhunter drummer Moses John Archuleta and he’s concocted a pleasant album of hypnogogic pop music that often sounds like he’s fallen asleep at the console. It has a severely blessed out vibe with hints of techno and house in the compositions which have an organic feel to them as if the music has come together using instruments and dub effects rather than the tweaks of a more digital set up. Therefore a lot of tracks remind me of Peaking Lights or Strategy - colossal dubbed up mood pieces that drift enigmatically.

The beats stray from impressive polyrhythms to simple drum machine through effects pedal and I suppose it’s the latter element of the album that is most disappointing as sometimes it leads certain tracks to plod. The fourteen minute ‘The Ghost and the Host’ has gorgeous atmospherics reminiscent of Gas but I’m wondering if Archulata has missed a trick in not adding live drums. The best track is saved 'til last  - ‘End of Heartache’ is superb  - an Arthur Russell style disco killer that should have probably opened up the album  - certainly it’s vibrancy could have been useful in the earlier stages of the record. It’s certainly worth the wait but there’s a lot of not unpleasant haze to get through first.