NAIVE

SCYTHE's vocalist and guitar player Thomas Thielen have released a solo album with the title "naïve" under the artist name "t". Thomas has written all the music and lyrics, he performs all the instruments and vocals by himself, and he has also produced, arranged, recorded and mixed the entire album. The music is a mix between Steve Hogart-era MARILLIN, NO-MAN, PINK FLOYD and RADIOHEAD. Some songs could've been taken from a SCYTHE album but the most of them are too experimental for that band. I would call it ambient, experimental, psychedelic neo-progressive rock, often with extensive, monotonous and repetitive themes. I have really tried to like this album and listened to it a lot, and the album isn't bad at all, but I have to say that I rather prefer SCYTHE's music before t's solo stuff.

T is the solo project of Thomas Thielen the singer/guitarist for SCYTHE. Thomas does it all on this one, he plays all the instruments, does the vocals, lyrics, engineering, producing and recording. This is often dark, sad and minimalistic which is normally right up my alley, but I honestly can't get into this record at all. In fact there really isn't much I do like about it which is unusual for me.

"She Said" features synths and spoken words in the background before piano and fragile vocals come in. The noisey synths continue with drums arriving 3 1/2 minutes in.The vocals stop for a couple of minutes before returning 8 1/2 minutes in,the song ends as it began. This song is emotional and intense but to get almost 11 minutes of it doesn't work for me. Maybe a short passage of this in a song but... "A Night Out" contrasts the heavier sections with the spacey, mellow ones quite well. "Round Here" is a ballad of piano and reserved vocals. "Do Not Come Back" is an instrumental with a lot of synths throughout. "Mother" opens with piano followed by experimental sounds.There is some orchestration in this one as well. Not a fan.

"A Day Like Any Other Day" is an experimental instrumental track with electronics and noises throughout. "She Is Dead" has this annoying percussion? along with synths, vocals and piano. It gets better 4 minutes in when the vocals become more passionate and haunting sounds arrive after 6 minutes. "Tuesday Night Blues" opens with acoustic guitar that is joined by piano. Synths and vocals come in along with a fuller sound 1 1/2 minutes in. Drums come in next. I like the chorus. This is a pretty good song. "Nothing More" features an annoying drum machine as we get reserved vocals and a slow pace. "The Dark" is ok as we get waves of spacey sounds throughout this instrumental. "About Us" opens with piano and vocals. A fuller sound comes in with strange sounds in the background. Why ? It settles down 5 1/2 minutes in before becoming full again a minute later.

Tough to listen to 68 minutes of something that you don't enjoy. Lots of electronics and the drum machine doesn't help. Collectors and fans only.