Four Tet are the kings of laptop folk rock. Their music carries on where the melancholic prepared pianos of Drukqs leave off. Music constructed from fragile instrumentation which I find strangely remisnicent of outlying places, like the Scottish Isles or the Newfoundland of E. Annie Proulx’s The Shipping News (the book, not the film).

The new album, Rounds, seems initially to retreat towards heavy hip hop beats. The soul is all still there though. The fifth track on my copy, Spirit Fingers, in particular, is no less tear-jerkingly lovely than anything else they’ve done. I’m a bit sad not to see tracks that combine rockin’ and loveliness as deftly as my favourite of their oeuvre, Everything Is All Right, although As Serious As Your Life has a go. As with Photek’s Ni Ten Ichi Ryu, I suspect Everything Is All Right just serves as a window on to what they listen to in heaven.

I’m not sure though, I’m on my fourth listen and it’s growing, growing fast.