Syro cover

Syro

Released

What we’re gonna do right now is go back, way back, back into time. After a decade away, James comes back—entirely unchanged. Or, rather, his form of change is returning to the past. This is a glorious, wickedly good revival. Some of it even sounds like James doing a riff on D-Train records. He even flips the “Apache” beat! This is our man going back into the baby photos and archives to figure out who he is. There’s also a piano track here for “Avril 14th” fans, which the Spotify algorithm has rewarded. I play Syro more than some of the old albums, so let’s call this a case of expertise on display.

Sasha Frere-Jones

Recommended by

Suggestions
HD cover

HD

Atom™
Whatever The Weather cover

Whatever The Weather

Whatever the Weather
Queries cover

Queries

Lithops
Dumb Flesh cover

Dumb Flesh

Blanck Mass
Iaora Tahiti cover

Iaora Tahiti

Mouse on Mars
Mujo cover

Mujo

Kazuya Matsumoto
No Sympathy cover

No Sympathy

Wanda Group, Basic House