Eric Shan’s long-running Phenotract monicker is an atmospheric, mostly gentle, ballad-skewed pop album well suited to a long steady road trip when there’s a synthpop fan in the car. Lush chords, simple lightweight rhythms, and an occasional strummed guitar taking a relative back seat, combine into a very smooth listen that’s like taking a warm unchallenging bath in songs.

There’s a generally languid feeling throughout, in many ways. There’s the relatively slow, sustained vocal style. There’s the dreamy philosophical lyrics concerned with “fleeting moments”, the sky, and plenty of swimming. There’s the casual pace of instrumentals like “Leap From The Top” and the slightly Vangelis-ish “Path Home Again”. Tracks like “Rivers”, one of the strongest numbers, have hints of what Stone Roses would’ve sounded like if they’d decided to be a synthpop band. All the tracks approach or pass the five-minute mark, taking the normal intro-verse-chorus structure and stepping through it without any urgency and with relatively few surprises.

Kathleen Gauder’s additional vocals on two of the tracks really add some polish and compliment Eric’s vocal very well. On the strength of those appearances she should be enlisted as a full member of the ‘band’.

It’s certainly well-produced. If I had to be picky I’d say it’s quirkily mixed in parts, with the more electronic touches slightly buried at points, and tracks like “Souls Intact” dipping the vocal level too low in a way that singers mixing their own performances quite often seem to do, but apart from little quibbles like that, it’s got a rich professional sound to it. It’s a comforting and slightly cathartic way to spend just shy of an hour.