Floating Points: Cascade

Floating Points has returned for his first album since Promises, his highly successful collaboration with the late Pharaoh Sanders and the London Symphony Orchestra in 2021. Cascade is a one-eighty from the tranquil ambience of Promises, with the electronic artist Sam Shepherd bringing listeners to the dance floor with minimalist techno precision. Throughout Cascade, Shepherd deftly maneuvers through subtle texture changes and dramatic builds without veering into oversaturated layers or predictable structures. “Birth4000” demonstrates this reserve, unrelenting in its drive while it snakes through varying timbres created through shifts in filters and tones. Shepherd works nimbly within well-loved, established parameters of dance music, all while subverting expectations and maintaining lean and dexterous textures. This capriciousness is apparent on the album’s longest track, “Ocotillo,” which opens with a quasi-medieval motif, before progressing with restless, Philip Glass-like intensity, frequently returning to the motif while the surrounding atmosphere barrels ahead with a rigid, yet wild loss of control. Cascade’s exhilarating unpredictability is what contributes to its contagious verve that can compel you to rip off your headphones and take Shepherd’s tracks straight to the club.