My Friend The Chimpanzee is a duo with immense talent and endless potential, and with 2Paradise, their first EP offering 3 songs and immense production and enjoyment value, we are left to only fantasize about what more can this imaginative duo give.
An Austrian duo, based in Vienna, My Friend The Chimpanzee is composed of Josef Umschaid’s beats and production, and Lukas Wieser’s guitars, synths, and voice. 2Paradise is the title of the duo’s first EP, and the 4 songs that makeup 2Paradise are exquisitely polished pieces of inventive indie pop with bold streaks of electronica that show up in the crystalline production and hard-hitting beats.
The three songs herald a distinctive sonic identity that put My Friend The Chimpanzee somewhere between M83’s electronic mayhem, Majical Cloudz’s whimsical otherworldliness, and the earthy soulfulness of Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard. The sound is characterized by easy-to-follow chord sequences, creative guitar or keyboard passages, and the dynamic vocal performances of Lukas Weiser.
From the entrancing space pop on starter ‘Be Careful What You Wish for’, with its blend of melancholia and roomy hopefulness that calls to mind the grandiosity of Death Cab for Cutie’s legendary album Transatlanticism, but louder, more electronic, and more colorful. The title song follows, and it is an upbeat bit of syncopated, neon-lit pop that sounds like a nod towards Coldplay’s Mylo Xyloto, with its emotive chord sequences and inventive guitars. The sound is tight and controlled, announcing the band had made it through this genre’s trap of making songs needlessly bombastic, and despite a lengthy crescendo that ends the song on a spoken passage, the song remains subdued. ‘Twin Moons/Bearwolf. Pt.2’ is the album’s M83 giveaway. From the galactic size of the synths, the slow, slumbering tempo, and processed space-age vocals, the duo takes their electronic tendencies to a new level on the expansive and stunning closer.
An endlessly enjoyable small collection of songs, 2Paradise is a welcome introduction to a creative duo that is capable of so much. Ending too soon, the EP has left us thirsty for more from My Friend The Chimpanzee.