I don’t usually write up artists with as small a following as Lieon, but I’m happy that I took the time to give this dude a shot because he’s got the chance to do something big here.
The EP is titled I Don’t Have a Girlfriend (But Music is Cool so I’m Okay With That), but that’s really fucking long and I don’t want to type it out every time, so I’m going to call it Girlfriend. Now, Girlfriend is very obviously influenced by Porter Robinson’s Worlds to a point where you wouldn’t even question it. A lot of producers take this influence too far and try to emulate Porter to unimpressive results.
Lieon, on the other hand, well … this might as well be Worlds Pt 2.
The whole EP has very magical quality to it. However, a lot of that magic is a bit dampened with the similarities to Worlds and its soundscape. “Hello, Hello!” is the only track that really breaks free from those shackles and it shines brilliantly for it. Others like “You” and “I’m Drunk So Here’s Why I Love You” follow very closely along with Porter’s sound, and the snare from “I Don’t Have A Girlfriend” sounds like it was ripped straight from “Divinity.”
But for all of that, and for a producer of Lieon’s size, this is one of the better EPs this year among all the submissions I’ve received. With a little more time to mature and develop his own sound, we could be looking at the birth of something big.
