Mercurial multimedia artist Roberto Lange perpetually keeps his spear sharp with interesting collaborations – from the much loved Prefuse 73 project Savath y Savalas to last year’s underrated OMBRE with Julianna Barwick. For his solo work, Lange truly couldn’t have picked a better title – Helado Negro, directly translated from Spanish as “black ice cream.” To wit, Helado Negro’s radiant sonic chill conduit is pretty doggone prefect for balmy summer nights.

Heavy shades of classic tropicalia, West Coast psychedelia, and analog-based electronica have always floated about Helado Negro’s balmy approach to subdued and glitchy pop. His latest though, Invisible Life, offers up a dash more cosmic funk. Propulsive lead single “Junes” broadcasts buoyant and loose aquatic space disco transmissions, perfectly capturing the nether-vibe between the space age bachelor pad and the club. As well, standout tracks “Lentamente” and “Arboles” showcase an even finer tuned sense of songwriting, with instantly hummable choruses and a broader palette of celestial tropical meditations.

To complement Lange’s persistent collaborative spirit, Invisible Life features Bear in Heaven’s Jon Philpot (a return-of-favor for Lange’s mixing of their sophomore Beast Rest Forth Mouth), Mouse on Mars’ Jan St. Werner, Devendra Barnhart, Matt Crum, and Eduardo Alonso. The result is a shapeshifting effort of both earthly and otherworldly beauty – his best yet.

Invisible Life is out today on Asthmatic Kitty.

And thanks to the good doctors at The Other Side of Life and Astro Black Records, you can catch him live with always excellent head music from Shedding.

Helado Negro with Shedding
Sunday, March 10th
Zanzabar, Louisville
9 p.m. / $6 / 21+ (Facebook event)

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