Once Syntaks was the solo project of Jakob Skøtt but everything changed when he started to collaborate with Anna Cecilia adding her vocals to a track on his 2006 album "Awakes". After that experience he decided to grow Syntaks to a duo and then started to work on this album YLAJALI. Ylajali is a woman's name that is coming from "Hunger", a novel that the Norwegian author Knut Hamsun wrote in 1888 when he stayed by the inner City lakes in capitol of Denmark and few yards by where this album have been recorded. To talk about this album I was thinking to divide the musical experience from the emotional one (because in this case they could be different) but then since both of them are deeply linked I thought, what the hell, let's talk about whatever it come to my mind. The fact is that this music is almost "impalpable", it produces sounds but it's like a morbid flow of waves. Do you remember the early 4AD records where guitar arpeggios were hidden between tons of flanger and reverbs? Well, this is the same case. Jakob built a thick wall of sound using many layers that fluctuate and that are lead by Anna Cecilia's chants. No words have been used on most of them (only the closing Dark night" seems to have lyrics), her singing is like the sea nymphs that are attempting to seduce sailors. Most of the sounds used on YLAJALI come from filtered guitar, synths and electronic drums but they sound as a whole soft cotton ball. Hypnotizing and fluffy these slow tunes will revive your passion for old shoegazer music and if you were a fan of later Cocteu Twins you should check this one.