Two minutes and thirty seconds into the title monitor of Rachika Nayar’s Heaven Come Crashing, a completely huge drum and bass beat drops. As a fan of Nayar’s debut report Our Palms In opposition to The Nightfall, it caught me off guard. That album has no percussion on it in any respect. Heaven Comes Crashing is sort of completely drum-free, too. There are some rapid-fire mechanical hi-hats on the second monitor, “Tetramorph,” and the again half of monitor six, “Gayatri,” has what seems like a snare buried deep within the combine. But it surely isn’t till monitor seven that Nayar delivers an sudden drum explosion, earlier than instantly retreating to the soothing wash of “Sleepless,” only one music later.
Nayar’s distinctive model of guitar-heavy ambient-adjacent music performs virtually like a model of M83 from an alternate universe. One the place as an alternative of turning to ‘80s pop music for inspiration, Anthony Gonzalez mined his instrumental epics for each final drop of emotion. Heaven Comes Crashing is as emotionally heavy because the title would indicate however makes use of surprisingly few phrases to get there. The one vocals come courtesy of Maria BC, who floats over the title monitor and the beautiful album nearer “Our Wretched Destiny,” the place she worldlessly belts out her laments.
There are lyrics on “Heaven Comes Crashing,” however they’re virtually indecipherable as Maria BC whispers beneath an ocean of flailing guitar traces and glowing drones:
Is it morning?
I don’t keep in mind going to sleep
How can we face the day
Like this?
You throw down your arms and rely to see
How deep it’s
As an alternative of phrases, Nayar turns to closely processed guitar, lonesome textures, and the occasional burst of trance chords to seize the determined longing on the album’s core. However the album can also be an indictment of the type of abandon that usually accompanies unbridled ardour. It’s bookended by “Our Wretched Fantasy” and “Our Wretched Destiny,” betraying a sure disgust for its personal emotional recklessness. Observe three isn’t “Dying and Love”; it’s “Dying and Limerence” — opting to highlight unhealthy romantic obsession somewhat than fulfilling emotional partnership, by way of U2-esque guitar traces that finally drown beneath closely reverbed and out-of-tune tremolo-picked notes.
That’s adopted by the unease of “Nausea,” which builds from an unsteady drone to maximalist panic of ‘90s synths and one of many easiest and prettiest guitar melodies on the report. The ambient emo of “Guarantees” follows, main into “Gayatri,” which ratchets up the power and serves as a bridge to the explosive title monitor.