Rhyton – Redshift

Pyschcadelic and Technical Prowess

Experimental jamming can go in many directions, from the classic Dead style to Pink Floyd other-worldliness, or from mid-tempo Phish ramblings to the outbursts of My Morning Jacket. Somewhere in all this, plus a couple more pedals, is Rhyton, a three-piece out of Brooklyn with the kind of instrument-driven improvised jams to let your mind relax and float downstream.

Part folk-rock and part psychedelic, Rhyton forms at the intersection of a power trio and experimental jam bands, and the result is something fanciful and winding and illustrative. They are each strong in their respective instruments–guitar, drums, and bass with the occasional keys–and they let each other go where the music takes them in the most literal sense. When one player gets in a groove, the rest of Rhyton locks in and stays along for the ride.

The opening jam on “The Nine” has a desert rock feel, not out of place in the southwest or perhaps the Middle East. It introduces the listener to the bigness of Rhyton, and their style that largely shies away from vocals but embraces their instruments for all their capacities—fuzzy guitars, tricky time signatures, and grooves aplenty.

When the vocals kick in on the title track “Redshift,” the listener is gifted with a new sense of place. The ethereal, renegade senses of the previous track are traded in for more traditional folk-rock, even including harmonies, but there’s still impressive solo work.

The middle chunk of the seven-track record is mostly instrumental “End of Ambivalence” resonates as just what the title suggests, the most aggressive track on the album. “D.D. Damage” is four minutes of slight dissonance and careful percussion, with a dizzying riff or two. It’s an excellent soundtrack for writing, reading, studying, pondering—or any other kind of mental exploration.

Vocal distortion on “Turn to Stone” is accompanied by a soul/funk bass line and psychedelic-style guitars. It’s a blending of influences that all have one quality in common: flow, and how effortless it can be. There’s nothing here that’s too jagged, too harsh or too punishing, but it’s hardly light fare given the depth of the musicality and darker tones. But this track offers the band at its jammiest and perhaps most palatable, given the hook.

Closer “The Variety Playhouse” has a haunted vibe, with slow, random sounds playing off one another. It’s a spooky soundtrack but a fantastic display of what great musicians can do when they let themselves play around a little, and free themselves from the boundaries of what a song is “supposed” to sound like.

Rhyton might not breakthrough to the mainstream with Redshift but there’s little chance they’re trying too–this is music for those who want to experience it as its technical and experimental edges, beyond the mainstream, beyond trends, beyond style or trope or any standard measures of success. All they’ll need is listeners and audiences who can appreciate what it takes to create music this expansive and join in on the fun.