Burial`s new EP 'Kindred'

A melancholic masterpiece, it's an album of intricate rain-soaked beauty that still takes our breath away. After a gorgeous collaboration with Massive Attack late last year, he's returned with a new EP. Kindred may be nothing new in terms of sound, but it shows that Bevan doesn’t necessarily need to break new ground to enrapture; he’s a master of his craft and it shows.

Off the three, "Kindred" (12-minute symphony No. 1) will be the most recognizable to Burial die-hards, featuring that same clanking metal-on-metal garage skip-and-swing. But this time something just feels heavier, harder, more devastating. Burial's been credited since the beginning as a prophet tying together UK genres old and new, but there's never been a better argument than "Kindred", which hints at the agility of jungle with the lead-footed heft of dubstep as seen through elliptical garage beats. They tumble and timestretch like vintage Metalheadz underneath smouldering Reese basslines, and the vocals lack Burial's usual phrases, instead choking out syllables smothered by the aural ash and soot that seems to soak the recording in a humongous, unearthly rumbling. As a whole "Kindred" sounds bigger than anything he's done before, an infinitely detailed behemoth that lumbers and shakes the ground beneath it with every little stroke of movement.

It's hard to talk about Kindred-- whether in the context of electronic dance music or just in the Burial discography itself-- without resorting to superlative terms, because it really is just that impressive.

You might not think of refinement when you think of Burial's productions, but just try to imagine it, and you'll get an idea of the kind of glory that Kindred carries. It still might not be the follow-up to Untrue that everyone's been waiting for, but format feels completely irrelevant. When those beats fall into place on the title track, nothing else matters for the next 30 minutes, until the crackle and fizz of "Ashtray Wasps" finally fades away. Then you put it on again. And again. And again.