Hybrid Device

Instinct's sister label has proved itself equipped with a keen eye for A&R, with a plethora of impressive downtempo signings since its inception. The Los Angeles-based duo Hybrid Device, aka Will Wood and Puneet Grewa, slips right in with contemporaries Droid and Shinju Gumi, setting effects-filled Floyd-like guitar meanderings adrift on vast lakes of aching liquid sound. Although perhaps a little indistinct, with the synth brass of "Old Habits" better left in the Casio from whence it came and the skeletal junglism of "Dr. Magneto" prompting a leap to the skip button of the CD remote, the tracks with melodic investment rise from the heat haze with confidence. "725" sounds like a hitherto undiscovered Turin Brakes instrumental, while the Western-tinged "Electric" sees dub snare strikes swing into the landscape of the track like a gunslinger.