Invisible Minds - Make Up Your Own Stories

To-date, the illusive creator behind the aptly named Invisible Minds, has remained somewhat of an enigma. When debut single ‘Yo Mae Leh’ rocketed to half a million streams in late 2017, gained playlist support from BBC 6 Music and champions by way of Lauren Laverne and Steve Lamacq; no one knew the mysterious mastermind was esteemed DJ, Tim Green.

Make Up Your Own Stories, feels a felicitous title. Less a departure and more a new chapter in Green’s adventure; the 11-track debut is a melding pot of musical inspiration that has been ruminating for over a decade, and crafted between studios, tours and rare quiet-moments. Revealing a more melodic side to Green’s musical personality, the vivacious debut is “honest and innocent and kinda searching for a feeling” as Green himself puts it.

From the guitar loop hypnotism of track ‘Autum’ and breathy haze of ‘The Cut Girl’ (one of three tracks featuring newcomer vocalist Howard Hobbs) to the MPC hip-hop of new single ‘905 Users!’, it’s a record inspired by everyone from Peter Gabriel to Icelandic icon Bjork. Compiling the album across a long time span, then working to turn them into a cohesive body of work was a surreal experience for Green: like looking back on old diary entries from across his entire adult life. “It’s funny – you go back to a particular track and can’t help but be transported back to where you were in your life when you wrote it,” he says. “There’s a lot of nostalgia in there.”

Nostalgic in its sentiment, but forward-thinking in its production; Make Up Your Own Stories marries synth melodies with deep bass squelches on epic finale ‘Take Them All’, the last track written for the album, while standout track ‘Jump Jet’ feels every bit as soaring and propulsive as its title would suggest. “Just when you thought you could come out of the shadows, there comes that poison drizzle in your ear hole,” a ghostly vocal intones over its Radiohead-ish bed of guitar, atmospherics and experimental percussion. Making use of the original Moog Model D and Voyager synths plus world instruments picked up on his travels “there’s a Chinese toy piano, a mbira from Tanzania and a kora from somewhere in Africa, but I can’t remember where…” – it’s sound never stops evolving across its enveloping 11-track runtime.

Pressed on double vinyl.

Yo Mae Leh
Jump Jet ft. Howard Hobbs
Blurtooth
Charilla ft. Hayley Hutchinson
905 Users!
Autum
The Cut Girl ft. Howards Hobbs
To The Same (Calm Mix)
Charged ft. Howard Hobbs
Light At Eventide
Take Them All ft. The Slow Revolt