Yot Club's 'Rufus' Is a Melting Pot of Sonic Spices
One pot cooking is a wonderful way to describe Yot Club’s latest album ‘Rufus’, a wondrous and delicious combination of sonic spices, stewing melodies together, flavors depending with each listening. On his sophomore album, the now NYC-based Ryan Kaiser, formerly of Mississippi, has taken a half decade of prep work and influences, from Soundcloud scratch cooking to multitrack collaborative haute cuisine, to create a legit opus of work. ‘Rufus’ is an album that truly marinates with each listening, a gift of emotions, nuances and familiar nostalgic portions that confuse then compound the palate.
As with most creative adventures, most of Ryan’s early successes were a happy accident, a youthful fearlessness applied with endless optimism to Bandcamp and Souncloud releases, until as Ryan deftly defines it, he “won the Spotify lottery” with “YKWIM?” a veritable viral hit that currently sits at over 1 billion streams, 600 million of which are from Spotify alone. As the track grew in profile, Ryan migrated from a subsistence living of school, bar cover band and a inordinate amount of time on playlist submissions to migrating to NYC, crafting a debut album and honing his sound. With increased attention from both his viral single and then his debut ‘off the grid,’ the lonely chord chemist vibes, tucked into internet based isolation started to ebb. Opportunities to collaborate, to co-cook on new music (including a ver early inquiry from FKA Twigs), and while it may not have been intuitive, Ryan humbly approached the process as a way to understand all that a Mississippi bedroom artist doesn’t have in their production pantry, a way to share the space.
If “YKWIM” was a satiating appetizer, ‘off the grid’ a dish of deeper depth and texture, than ‘Rufus’ is a full meal of multi-genre pop, a cure to all curious appetites, substantive and filled with emotive contemplation. The juxtaposition of both retro dreamy, psych rock adjacent sounds as found on ‘Too Far Gone’ is paired with a newer fresher stew of sounds, leaning into new tempos, less distorted vocals, fresh and futuristic like the album focus track ‘Human Nature’ written with Harrison Lipton. Speaking of the collaboration on the single, Ryan said:“‘Human Nature’ was one of the few songs on the album I didn’t make alone, I wrote it with my friend Harrison Lipton at his parents’ house in Connecticut. They lived in a really pretty area so it was nice to get out of the city for a couple of days and work out there. The song came together quickly and I knew early on I wanted it to be a single.”
And that contrast of styles is what make the album so easy to consume, its a true journey of indie delicacies, a treat unwrapping one after another. ‘Rufus’ is a feast of You Club’s best sounds, spiced to taste it hits across a spectrum, familiar but challenging priors, sharpening with each play, deceptively filling despite its lightness in delivery. If you are craving a record that listens like a one pot meal eats, then ‘Rufus’ is your cook.
