Will Hofbauer
Mudpuller
KANN
Will Hofbauer’s music has a garish quality to it. Writer Joseph Francis, for example, once compared the UK artist’s production to a video game, but I tend to think of it as being closer to the bright, squishy textures of children’s toys. This may be because I spend an inordinate amount of time with children’s toys (and with them lodged in my feet), but even though Hofbauer’s tunes have all the ingredients of club destroyers (e.g. layers of sub bass, chromatic melodies), they’re also squiggly, almost soft. Take the title track from his new EP, Mudpuller. The bass hits you in the viscera, but the bursting bouquet of synths dots the stereo field like sprinkles on soft serve.
“Sling Sling” is just as technicolor, but slinky and slower with an emphasis on the drums. At first, airy hand drums ricochet under shifting synth lines and little hits of bass before he unveils a dry and funky snare pattern in the song’s final half. Call it “tin soldier minimal.” The record also includes an ambient outro and two remixes from Eden Burns, who fleshes the title track out into a serious club tune. For my money, however, Hofbauer’s records always hit the hardest when he’s painting with his own rainbow palette.
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