Hiatus Kaiyote Unveil New Album 'Love Heart Cheat Code'

Hiatus Kaiyote embrace their wild side on Love Heart Cheat Code, the Naarm / Melbourne collective's first studio album since 2021's breakout Mood Valiant. A joint release out today via Flying Lotus' Brainfeeder imprint and Ninja Tune, Love Heart Cheat Code maintains the creative flow of that earlier record (numerous songs on LHCC were sparked during MV's sessions), feeling even more uplifting and adventurous as Naomi "Nai Palm" Saalfield, Paul Bender, Simon Mavin and Perrin Moss probe the interstellar boundaries of neo-soul lushness — smashing through the cosmic source wall into avant-jazz / future-funk / electronica realms. They're joined this time by Beastie Boys studio wiz Mario Caldato Jr. on co-production duties, who worked closely with the group in L.A. to realise their vision — notably: "Nai did some vocals on 'Cinnamon Temple' on this shitty Sony karaoke mic that Mario owns that like a lot of Beastie Boys vocals were recorded through".

Conceived as "a snapshot of four musicians dancing together on the edge", Love Heart Cheat Code is like a shapeshifting quilt of multi-layered genre elements, each carefully crafted section sitting in unlikely harmony with the rest. Standouts amidst a strong batch include the funk philosophising of 'Dimitri', the radiant exuberance of 'Everything's Beautiful', celestial jazz-funk groover 'Telescope', the purring playfulness of 'Longcat' (finally a tribute to the meme legend), the raucously punky 'Cinnamon Temple' and the group's straight up warped concluding take on Jefferson Airplane's 'White Rabbit'. Also featuring contributions from Taylor “Chip” Crawford (player and maker of the frello), guitarist Tom Martin and flautist Nikodemos, order the vinyl LP edition HERE, and listen closely to crack the Love Heart Cheat Code...

"It definitely feels a lot lighter and sort of buoyant than the last record, which definitely had some, some heaviness attached, which was the time in the world that we were all having. But I don't know, this one, there's a lot more straight up joyous kind of stuff. I feel a lot of positivity in this record." - Paul Bender

'Love Heart Cheat Code' is out today via Brainfeeder Records / Ninja Tune.