Fresh material from the most talented Mr Trago.

Locked in during 2020/21, Tom Trago kept himself busy by increasing his daily music-making activities. As he had done pre-pandemic, Trago set aside time each day to improvise and record tracks in the studio attached to his home in Bergen on the Netherlands’ North-West coast.

Tide Will Turn, Trago’s third release on the Jong Nederlands label he established to share his work, showcases three such outings. As with previous EPs on Jong Nederlands, each of the tracks was created using a small selection of electronic instruments, drumcomputers and effects units.

EP opener ‘Number Own’ is typically emotive and quietly colourful, with chiming lead lines, sustained synthesizer chords, stirring riffs and fluid electronic motifs rising above bustling, body-popping beats and a smooth, jazzy bassline. Bubbly and ear-pleasing, it’s the aural equivalent of watching sunlight bounce off the waves that wash up on the beach just a few hundred metres from Trago’s studio.

Title track ‘Tide Will Turn’ is an altogether more relaxed and becalmed affair. Its drowsy chords and gentle, undulating melodies slowly sashay their way between clicking drum machine percussion and slow-motion beats. Trago picks things up again on ‘Understood’, wrapping attractive synth stabs, cascading lead lines and fizzing electronics around a pulsating bassline and breathless, all-action, electro-influenced beats. It provides a fittingly attractive and emotion-rich conclusion to another fine batch of straight-to-tape improvisations.