Review: New Single from Twins - ‘Life Forgetter’
New Single from Twins - ‘Life Forgetter’
A familiar face on the SE London music circuit through his art synth group, Rocheman, Loz Keystone spent 2024 embarking on his own solo voyage birthing his musical project, Twins.
‘Life Forgetter’ is the first single from Twins’ debut EP, alongside a misty and intimate music video, depicting Loz’s current 2025 caravan residency on a farm outside of Bristol.
Although this track is built on simple instrumentation, there is an alluring and thoughtful layering of guitars, percussion and bass. The lyrics themselves draw attention to the over-complication of life and the need for a ‘back to basics’ approach. This, combined with Keystone’s powerful yet gentle vocal delivery, has a bewitching effect.
Twins seemingly pull from a range of vocal influences, marking a cross between British Folk, Alt Rock and Grunge. The result? Something that feels new and interestingly unique.
The song begins with a warm, finger-plucked acoustic guitar, paired with slightly distorted piercing fragments of a lost melody in reverse. Once Keystone’s voice begins, his drawn-out melancholic phrases expand the sonic space, as if we are being swept away in a rolling wave. This sense of expanse continues in the music video, where open, icy landscapes and free roaming animals are the focus of most of the visual piece.
When paired with lyrics like, “collect your words into tiny piles of tidiness that you can keep/And know where the ground is before you step”, we are being challenged as a collective to consider how we have lost connection to our sense of self through over-intellectualisation and the constant need for cultural and technological advancement, despite the growing destruction of the environment and thus, ourselves. We get small glimpses of Twins, who sits by the door of his caravan playing his guitar. The handheld unsteadiness of the footage, particularly during these moments inside the caravan, seem to visually mirror the suggested instability of humanity. It reminds us that we are separating ourselves from our own natural tendencies and creativity through labels, unnecessary ideals and most importantly, from our curiosity of the world around us.
Despite these jarring bolts of truth, the beautifully open and cavernous melodies across only a few notes, containing lines like, “You feel insane/Life forgetter”, bring the listener back to a shared empathy. We are asked to explore how it feels when we are disconnected from ourselves and each other.
The theme of ‘life’ weaves through this track deeply, offering hope as it does so; the message being that we can always find our way back to the source of who we are. Musically, this is conveyed through the uncomplicated choice of chords, melodies and almost ‘heartbeat’ driven drums and percussion. The power of such a clearly expressed arrangement proves itself stunningly effective throughout this track, as use of the stereo field is fruitful. It moves slowly and gently using delicate additional layers and, yet, produces a full, completely transformative and emotionally charged soundscape. A truly beautiful and thought-provoking piece of work, only enhanced and developed in the imagery and ideas of the video.
We are waiting for the full Twins EP with great anticipation!
You can find more on the website, Soundcloud, and YouTube.
Written by Yanna Avlianos
Opinion
