Review
Genre and Mood
Klyne’s Closer is electronic synth-pop at a downtempo pace, the styles its first vinyl release is filed under. Its feelings are soulful and determined: a record shop that sold that vinyl called it “a perfectly crafted and executed slice of electronic-pop”, and the duo describe a song about refusing to accept the limits of fate.
Song Summary
Closer followed the debut single Paralyzed in the autumn of 2015. The duo explained it in their own words: it is about someone going to the extreme to reach a lifelong desire while coping with the fear that their fate is already decided, and about the moment you realise you are halfway there. “That’s the simple story we wanted to convey with this song”, they added, “that and a ridiculous topline.” As described, the arrangement is lean: staccato synths under Nick Klein’s soulful voice.
Musical Breakdown
No source we found walks through this recording section by section or gives its times, so the guide follows the elements the sources name.
The Synth Lines
Piccadilly Records heard “an infectious edge” in the staccato synth lines: short, detached figures, not long held chords.
The Vocal
Those lines are “topped off” with what the same review called Klein’s “measured soulful mastery”: a voice that stays controlled rather than showing off.
The Topline
The topline, the sung melody, is the part the duo themselves pointed to, with affection, as ridiculous.
Concepts in Focus
A synthesizer can hold a note for as long as a key is down, or cut it short. Staccato means short and separated, and synth lines played that way turn a pad instrument into something closer to percussion. That is the edge the review heard in Closer: the synths do not wash, they tick.
In pop production the topline is the vocal melody written over a finished or half-finished track, and it is usually where the hook lives. Calling their own topline ridiculous reads like a fond joke about a melody that will not leave.
The music video was directed by Jon Olav Stokke and appeared on the duo’s YouTube channel on 5 November 2015.
Artistic Context
Klyne are the Dutch duo of singer Nick Klein and producer Ferdous Dehzad, who grew up in the south of the Netherlands, with Indonesian and Afghan roots, and started making music together as teenagers. Their upload of Paralyzed went viral in 2015. MusicBrainz dates the first release of Closer to 14 October 2015; on 20 November Aesop put it on a 12-inch with Klyne – Waiting, Klyne – Paralyzed and Entropy, and Because Music issued the same four songs as Closer on 5 February 2016. The song is not on their 2017 album Klyne; a piano version appeared on the B-Sides EP that year.
Impact and Reception
Piccadilly Records saw Closer, with Paralyzed, as the proof that set the duo apart as “a hugely exciting prospect for 2016”. Since then the duo has shared stages with Christine and the Queens, Metronomy and Years & Years and remixed Disclosure and Sam Smith. Listen for the short synth notes, then let the topline decide whether it is ridiculous.
