{"id":673492,"date":"2026-11-03T08:00:11","date_gmt":"2026-11-03T08:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/673492\/"},"modified":"2026-11-03T08:00:11","modified_gmt":"2026-11-03T08:00:11","slug":"two-shell-infinite-now-album-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/673492\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Shell: Infinite Now Album Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe Nightmare,\u201d the opening track of their new album, reveals the problem almost instantly. It\u2019s built around a bubbly, effervescent ascending melody that reminds me of SOPHIE<\/a>\u2019s \u201cNothing More to Say<\/a>\u201d with all the fun ripped out, while a flimsy voice sings, \u201cWelcome to the nightmare.\u201d The vocals scan as inhuman, the drums don\u2019t really do much, and all the synths seem just a little off, everything brushed with a plasticky sheen that sounds like it came right off the assembly line, made by robotic arms<\/a> for robotic arms.<\/p>\n

That uneasy feeling settles over the rest of Infinite Now like suffocating humidity. No matter how hard the duo tries to get things going, the spark never catches: Build-ups and drops land with a thud, because how can you have payoff without tension? The hooks are aggravating because the vocals are aggravating, like on \u201cLose Control,\u201d a pale imitation of Daft Punk<\/a>\u2019s \u201cOne More Time,\u201d that group\u2019s painstaking ingenuity replaced by \u201cit\u2019s just a tool\u201d deflection. Worse yet, the album is mired in a mid-tempo slog that feels like it was designed for late-morning Ibiza zombies. \u201cFollow\u201d is like something tech-house stalwart Jamie Jones could have cooked up in his sleep in 2009, far removed from the genius of Two Shell\u2019s \u201chome<\/a>\u201d or even their latter-day collaboration with FKA twigs<\/a>, \u201cTalk to Me<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even if it used some of the same AI tools, \u201cTalk to Me\u201d was fun because, at that point, it exemplified the group\u2019s greatest sonic tricks. They had a way of abusing filters and volume fluctuations to create club music that felt like it was always in flux\u2014thrillingly volatile, vocals stretched thin and passed through a sieve. But the possibility that these new tracks were augmented by AI saps the novelty, in the same way that an AI video of a raccoon climbing a string of Christmas lights isn\u2019t cute in the slightest. For a while, Two Shell\u2019s antics\u2014like sending in decoy DJs pretending to mix\u2014were divisive, but at least the music was exciting. By now, the project feels cynical. Not only can they not be bothered to show up to their own gigs, but they\u2019d also like us to believe they can\u2019t even muster the energy to make their own songs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe Nightmare,\u201d the opening track of their new album, reveals the problem almost instantly. It\u2019s built around a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":673493,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[692,93,61,60,278,514],"class_list":["post-673492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-albums","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music","tag-web"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=673492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/673492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/673493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=673492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=673492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=673492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}