ALBUM REVIEW: Vanishing Twin – Afternoon X

Fire Records

Released: 06.10.23

Since debuting with 2016’s Choose Your Own Adventure, Vanishing Twin have occupied a worthy musical niche – namely that in the absence of a new Stereolab album, we might as well enjoy the next best thing. Even against this somewhat cynical framing, however, the band’s fourth full-length feels like a significant breakthrough.

Concocted by a slimmed creative core of vocalist Cathy Lucas, percussionist Valentina Magaletti and bassist Susumu Mukai, Afternoon X is a masterclass in minimal kosmisch; playful, audacious and remarkably self-assured; driven by curiosity and a process which values the journey over the destination. It makes for a frequently surprising, wholly engrossing experience – by some distance the group’s most singular, experimental and best record to date.