All Up In Your Mind

The recordings of many kitchen-sink producers — Four Tet and Manitoba/Caribou come to mind — can reveal so little of their means of creation that a listener simply accepts the parade of otherworldly sounds without reflecting on how difficult it must have been to create them. Montreal-based P-Love has a similar method (specifically the heavy use of his own live playing enhanced with a little post-production), and also a similar ability to craft relentlessly catchy tracks, but his material still has the whiff of the kitchen to it. In fact, most of his songs sound like they could have been played live in the studio if he'd invited a few of his friends over — and his list of instruments doesn't include anything more exotic than a stylophone (the exception is one track where friend Matt Kelly contributed "blips and bleeps"). Don't assume from the above that All Up in Your Mind is an organic-sounding record, or something that's been done by others in the past. Like Tortoise, P-Love appears to have his musical ideas in his head before he begins recording, and structures his performances accordingly. A few tracks of angular, melodic pop give way to reflective material midway through, but it doesn't matter what type of production he turns to — they're all excellent tracks.