The soundtrack to my life over the last month has been Tycho’s outstanding new album, Simulcast - the instrumental companion to 2019’s Weather. In fact, I’ve been listening to this album so obsessively that it became incentive to resurrect this personal blog of mine.
For the uninitiated: Tycho is the brainchild of San Francisco-based musician Scott Hansen. Since 2011’s acclaimed Dive, Hansen has been producing all his Tycho albums alongside his touring band, giving his project a signature sound that combines crisp live instruments with meditative electronic soundscapes. Tycho’s music has been variously described as “ambient electronica,” “post-rock” and “office space music.” More on that at the end of this post.
Tycho is a very personal discovery of mine. I found them through a Reddit post in my sophomore year of high school - which, mind you, did not see me at my best in school nor in life. Seeing a lot of praise for the band in the comments, I put on their album Awake out of curiosity. I found that it made such good study music that I actually stopped procrastinating on Reddit and finished several hours’ worth of work with the album on loop.
It was only once I took off my headphones and let my ears cool off that I realized what just happened. Holy shit, I thought. After all this time, this is what got me to get my work done. No calendars, tutors, or motivational TED talks, but some fucking music I found on Reddit.
I made it a habit over the next few months to listen to Awake everyday, and at least spend enough time working to cover the entirety of the album’s length. I would usually end up lasting multiple playthroughs.
In a way, Tycho didn’t just get me off my ass that year, but in fact helped me to start enjoying school and take my work ethic more seriously. It was music as therapy.
While that hasn’t changed in the years since, Tycho definitely has. In 2019, they shook things up with the release of Weather, the first Tycho album to feature vocals. While it earned them their first Grammy nomination, the album wasn’t exactly received well by fans, many of whom accused Hansen of selling out to pop radio and dismissed Weather as “generic,” “uninspired” and “disappointing.” I didn’t share in the vitriol, but I definitely didn’t see the record in league with Awake or its 2016 follow-up, Epoch.
However, with the release of the instrumental volume Simulcast at the end of February, I’ve grown very thankful for the existence of Weather. See, these “instrumentals” aren’t simply the original backing beats with the vocals removed. Hansen has in fact reworked each song into its own unique arrangement, complete with different melodies, instruments, song structures, and even track names. While Weather and Simulcast are certainly complements to one another, Hansen has made a sincere effort to ensure that each project has its own individual tone and identity. That itself is a pretty incredible feat.
While I hold the most sentimental attachment to Awake, I would consider Simulcast to be Tycho’s best and most accessible work to date. This is mainly because of the lack of filler - every track has a distinct genre, personality and “hook,” which makes the project feel more like a greatest-hits compilation than a conventional LP. I mean that as a compliment.
The album very much owes this quality to the indie-pop sensibilities of Weather. Whereas previous Tycho albums were abstract electronic compositions that emphasized atmosphere, Simulcast builds that same aesthetic around a more traditional pop record, resulting in an album that sounds very much like the “classic” Tycho, but sleeker, sexier and catchier.
While all eight tracks on Simulcast are worth going over in detail, my personal favorite is “Outer Sunset,” a rework of “Skate” off of Weather. It’s the song I’ve been using to withstand the shitty weather while walking through my university campus for the past month. By listening to it at least once everyday, I’ve gotten the chance to fully internalize its structure and progression, and I find that it’s the most successful at fulfilling the mission of Simulcast.
As Hansen stated in an Instagram post, his intent with Weather and Simulcast was to “present the same ideas in two languages, one more literal and the other more open to interpretation.” In this case, “Skate” is a strikingly minimal and intimate track made of nothing but a single guitar riff and the voice of Hannah Cottrell, aka Saint Sinner. It doesn’t exactly say much lyrically, but Hansen thought those two elements alone fit together so elegantly that he decided to leave the song at that.
“Outer Sunset,” on the other hand, simply uses the “Skate” riff as the first building block of a more elaborate, multilayered arrangement. The new version cycles three distinct guitar melodies over a warm bed of synth pads and softened keyboards. A distorted drum break has been added to give the track a stronger groove, and the overall structure of the rework is much more varied and freeform compared to its predecessor. I’ve attached both songs here so you can observe the difference for yourself.
Whenever I listen to “Outer Sunset,” I’m always amazed by how it starts with such simple source material before completely taking on a life of its own. Despite its meandering composition, the song’s detailed production still forms a beautiful “narrative arc” that takes repeat listens to appreciate, much like rereading a book. The feeling of escape created by that arc gives “Outer Sunset” that same therapeutic quality I’ve found in past Tycho albums, making it my favorite cut off of Simulcast.
That being said, compare any Simulcast instrumental with its Weather counterpart and you will see the earnestness of Hansen’s artistic vision on full display. He and the band have given such a fresh voice to all of these reworks that it’s obvious Simulcast is more than just appeasement to pissed-off Weather listeners, and in fact some of the most boldly creative material Tycho has put out in years.
For example, while Weather’s “Pink & Blue” puts a playful synthpop beat over Saint Sinner’s lyrics about her polyamorous relationship, the rework “PCH” strips away the vocals and instead emphasizes stuttering guitars and ominous synths, giving the latter track a darker, grittier edge. “Japan,” which I found to be the catchiest pop tune on Weather, has been turned into the 6-minute “Cypress,” which gets its extended length from a trippy, psychedelic middle section that wasn’t present in the original.
Other Simulcast tracks aren’t just complements to the Weather versions but superior to them. “Alright” takes on a cathartic, airborne quality from its deep basses and explosive percussion, which is a lot compared to its forgettable source track “For How Long.” And the album closer, “Stress,” is ironically much more relaxing to listen to than the original “No Stress.” Its final minute is a thing of pure beauty.
These rearrangements have been packaged alongside the three instrumental entries from Weather, which were all excellent to begin with and remain unchanged for Simulcast. Together, the eight tracks not only provide fresh perspective on the previous album, but stand on their own as an exciting and authentic new addition to Tycho’s discography. Hansen has written posts explaining his approach to each of the songs on his Instagram, further underscoring the ambition and creative insight that went into producing this record.
But to return to my point at the start of this post: Simulcast succeeds for me because it continues Tycho’s tradition of adding a contemplative, soothing ambiance to the busy reality of everyday life. This album, too, has definitely helped me get my work done faster, enjoy the outdoors a little extra, or just let go of my frustrations for a few hours.
Apparently, not everyone considers this a plus: Pitchfork, in their typically obnoxious, pseudo-intellectual sneer, dismissed Simulcast as “background music for a prescription drug commercial.” Their bizarre review of the album compared Tycho’s music to the corporate workspace culture of Silicon Valley, and suggested that its sole artistic purpose was to boost the productivity of the “21st-century open-office drone.”
I would argue that those productivity-enhancing qualities are a side effect of a musical style that is subdued by nature. After all, I myself started listening to Tycho as a study tool (because I wasn’t going to concentrate on a damn thing to Kanye West, was I?) But a closer look at Hansen’s work will make clear that its direction is artistic and not utilitarian, and certainly not as “faceless” as a lo-fi study beats playlist, as the fine folk at Pitchfork would have you believe. It’s music that is as good at commanding your attention as focusing it on your existing state of mind, which just happens to be a great way to get your shit done.
How else do you think this blog post came about, anyway?
—
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed it, go ahead and share it out to your social media. I hope to publish on my blog more regularly. I’ve missed it dearly.