Kinbrae - Cryptophasia

A Closer Listen

Cryptophasia is a language shared by twins that only they can understand.  On the new album of the same name, twin brothers Andy & Mike Truscott (popularly known as Kinbrae) use music to reflect their decades-long relationship.  This is the first full-length LP from Kinbrae since Birl of Unmap, their 2022 collaboration with Clare Archibald; their sound has grown subtler, but the beauty remains intact.

The album tells a chronological story, beginning with “Vermiculation” (another great vocabulary word) and “Language Development.”  The brothers have listed struggles, individual and collective, and there is some melancholy to be gleaned here, but the primary tone is triumphant.  For this we can credit the brass, ever present in the background yet occasionally surging to the fore.  We have the benefit of knowing that the brothers’ introspection eventually produced this album, so of course it’s triumphant; the very existence of the copper-colored LP implies a happy ending to the current chapter of their lives.

The album is pared-back, devoid of collaborative dialogue.  Instead, the brothers invite listeners to attempt a double translation of music and language.  If “Language Development,” a languid piece that borders on drone, is the pupae stage, then “Increasing Daylight” is the imago.  A beat returns as the piano takes center stage, leading to a Sigur Rós-like euphoria of melodic brass. Everything comes crashing down at the end, but an unidentified rustle can still be heard.

Fittingly, “Separation Anxiety” is the closest the album comes to agitation.  The twins now live in Edinburgh and Fife, Scotland.  Their private language has blossomed into a musical flower.  Even this piece, which begins with such density, finds clarity as it progresses.  It’s a safe bet to say that the same is true of the brothers’ relationship, especially given the title “Ex Aequo” (which means “on equal footing” ~ our brains are getting a workout today!).  “Dizogotic” yields the LP’s saddest, most reflective moments, separated by the near-silence of a distant drone; but it also rises to the album’s second-grandest moment, echoing the earlier euphoria.  When “Vernal Equinox” arrives, the twins are ready for a new season in their relationship, equally balanced as day and night or a dizygotic egg standing on its end.  (Richard Allen)