Tourist - Everyday

Tourist - Everyday 

There’s a couple of phrases I’ve always been wary of. “Lads lad” has always remained squarely at the top of that list. “White supremacist” follows closely after. Rounding out the unholy trinity is “artists artist.” What does that even mean? It sounds like something that poncey gentlemen in dinner jackets admire over the rim of a crystal decanter. This is how Willaim Phillips is introduced in an interview with We Run The Nite NYC. The 'artist's artist' Normally it’d be a hard pass, but the latest work from producer Phillips, aka Tourist, defies snobbish perceptions, seeking instead to deconstruct human emotions down their basic forms. Austere in both nature and structure (cover artwork comes from photographer Nigel Shafran), Everyday is as much a mission statement as it is a time frame, a wish to dissect the common and expose what lies beneath.

The work of Phillips often follows such a path. The co-writer of Sam Smith breakthrough tune ‘Stay With Me’, human emotion and its interpretation have always been in his wheelhouse. In speaking to We Own The Nite NYC, Phillips said his aim was to “explore human themes through… samples, sounds and melodies.” A weighty task not to be taken lightly, and one achieved through the silky overtones and deconstructed storytelling of Tourist.

The key goal of Everyday is that of exploration. Inspired by his travels (luckily he chose the perfect nom de plume), the album has the density of an introspective journey. Minimalist and bare, Phillips leaves nothing on the table and yet manages to encourage interpretation. Electronic overtones and a lack of ‘human’ noises may sound like odd tools with which to mine into personalities. Yet Phillips manages to stimulate imagination, allowing listeners to forge their own expeditions into his sonic landscape. ‘Emily’ for instance is a waterfall of spiritual vocals, crepuscular synth and translucent beats that is neither confrontational nor conformist. Its demands nothing and offers everything. In contrast to this is the industrial claustrophobia of 'hearts', with its suffocating drum track and beguiling, brooding moan. Its breathless nature, amidst a cacophony of woodblock, dizzying keys and tender ambience elicits tension, while the former invokes calm. Instead of cancelling each other out, they work in tandem to create a larger story, acting as a high and low that are equally essential in the grand scheme.

The blueprint of Everyday continues as such, with each track presiding over a different realm of emotion. And despite the lack of lyrics, they each have plenty to say. Be it the swooning, anxious lust of ‘Someone Else’ (starry keys and shimmering hymns), the liquid melancholy of ‘Gin Under The Sink’ (blurting pulses, frothing reverberation) or the sunrise sheen of Apollo (thick, deep beats with a frenetic rhythm), Everyday is a crusade through the halls of the human condition. In an attempt to explain the intangible, Tourist manages to give form to the formless and is anything from mundane. It’s not something you see Everyday.