Jon Hopkins : RITUAL
The first time I engaged with the music of Jon Hopkins was in a crowd of people watching his set opening for an imperial phase-era Coldplay in 2008. To open for a maximalist band like that with what amounted to a fascinating exercise in restraint took considerable guts, and I was intrigued. Hopkins was then a good five months off releasing his breakthrough album Insides, which no doubt struck a chord due to the appearance of “Light Through the Veins,” a snippet of which forms the basis of bookends on the headline act’s Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends. He made a bunch of new fans that night, and Insides ended up being one of my favorite records of 2009. All of this is to say you need to stick with RITUAL.
In the context of his output thus far, this is somewhere halfway between Music For Psychedelic Therapy and Singularity—as his star has risen, he’s been playing to bigger and bigger crowds, and you need to understand where he’s come from to grasp where he’s at now. For every “Abandon Window” or “Emerald Rush,” there’s also a “Tayos Caves, Ecuador” or the Asleep Versions counterpoint to Immunity. Subtlety has always been a force at play in his production and creation style, and there’s a whole world of nuance to be explored throughout RITUAL that benefits from attentive listening; a good set of headphones will help, too, because “Altar” reaches cavernous depths that can be felt as well as heard.
An eight-movement piece designed to be listened to in one sitting, one aspect of the record that immediately stands out is its masterful sound design, more cinematic in scope than listeners may be used to from Hopkins. It calls for a different kind of immersion than its predecessor; there are no Ram Dass talks or particular sonic cues to rely on, with even the title and track names open to interpretation. There’s an intensity and physicality to much of the material presented here; moments have weight and presence, with “Palace/Illusion” kicking in with a steady half-time pulse that’s gone before you know it’s arrived. Hopkins refuses to allow the listener to get comfortable, the track shifting uneasily between chord voicings before swooping upward for “Transcend/Lament,” joined by keening vocal samples and displaying an example of Hopkins in a flow state; once he’s locked in, you know it. You feel it.
The beauty of RITUAL lies in the fact that you get as much out of it as you put in. Its ambient leanings mean you can put it on as background music and let it run, but it deserves closer examination, particularly as a creeping sense of unease sets in on “The Veil,” settling back into a drone that’s joined by stabs of dissonance and percussion that grows in prominence, before things crest to a dramatic peak with “Evocation,” the piece’s most restless moment; get some four-on-the-floor kicks behind it and we’d immediately find ourselves in more familiar territory, but it opts instead for an escalating feeling that’s equal parts awe and dread. We’re never offered anything more than implication about the “ritual” itself, but as “Solar Goddess Return” serves up another tectonic shift, and a building sense of tension that seems so intense as to never break, it’s left to the listener to ponder the purpose of this music. Originally, its seeds were sown as a commission for the 2022 Dreamachine experience in London, and the ceremonial nature took root, to be keenly felt in the finished product.
Things end as they began, with Hopkins returning to the meditative state suggested by “Altar,” mirrored in a somewhat less oppressive fashion in the album’s literal “Dissolution,” as the drone that underpins the entire thing gradually fades to be replaced by a typically beautiful piano finale called “Nothing is Lost”—somber and reflective in nature, it nonetheless rides the currents of mutating chords and murmured vocal interjections off into the sunset. RITUAL does nothing less than command attention for 41 minutes; even at its most intimate moments, it’s captivating. At its boldest and most cinematic, it’s got power and presence behind it that would make even the grandest era of Coldplay blush. Strap in and enjoy the ride.
Label: Domino
Year: 2024
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Jon Hopkins : Ritual
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