Infinite Health is the engrossing seventh album by Tycho, the project of celebrated San Francisco songwriter, musician and producer Scott Hansen. The album will be released on August 30 via Mom + Pop Records in the U.S. and Ninja Tune in the rest of the world.

Since the project’s inception in 2001, Hansen has become a leader in downtempo, ambient, IDM, and related genres. Pitchfork has described his music “gorgeously constructed”; Allmusic hailed it as “lovingly rendered.” “The aural equivalent of exploring a new art museum,” Paste declared. “The overall effect is one of remarkable beauty and you still have the option of how you’ll take it in.”

Along the way, Tycho has earned two GRAMMY nominations, written a plethora of interstitial and background music for Adult Swim programming, and collaborated with Death Cab for Cutie’s Benjamin Gibbard for “Only Love.”

Now, Hansen has followed up 2020’s Simulcast — a sister album to 2019’s Weather — with this captivating new offering. Although it retains the personnel of recent works — as usual, Zac Brown shares guitar, and Rory O’Connor’s behind the kit — Hansen considers Infinite Health to mark a third era for Tycho.

“The goal for me was to get back to the way I had been producing music in the early 2000s, that led up to [2011’s] Dive,” Hansen says. “A more electronic production style, focusing on breaks, drums and rhythmic elements. Then, using that as the foundation, and having all the instrumentation follow that lead, as opposed to the other way around.”

Hansen also dove into the Infinite Health recording process with aural distinctiveness, and concision, as artistic goals. “The big overarching concept, at least on the technical side, is ‘Let’s try to make this sound as different as possible,” he explains.

These were partly achieved through an emphasis on the uptempo, danceable elements of Tycho’s sound, and keen co-production by Grizzly Bear’s Chris Taylor. By utilizing a palette of chopped up drums and warm, rounded guitars, Infinite Health becomes its own miniature world. “I’m really happy with how the whole thinng feels like a singular sonic expression,” Hansen says.

Opener “Consciousness Felt” began as many Tycho songs do: by Hansen and Brown just sitting down and jamming, for an extended period, with the recording light on.

“I cut out elements and composited them back together,” Hansen says, “but that main riff and bass interaction are pretty much what we played in the moment — a few minutes-long section during that 20 minutes.” The visceral, driving track will be catnip for fans of Interpol, who Hansen calls “probably my favorite modern band.”

What follows is “Phantom” — Hansen’s favorite song on Infinite Health. Not only did Hansen spend more hours on it than any other track; it represents an artistic growth spurt. “I played a Juno emulation for that bassline, and I feel like that bassline, and style of bass playing, is something pretty new for me,” he says. “I’m just stoked on how that came out.”

“Restraint” is a sterling example of how Hensen can spin gold out of old methods. “Before I learned how to play guitar way back, I would play guitar patches on a workstation or synth,” he explains. “I always thought that had interesting results, because you’re able to do things you wouldn’t be able to do on a guitar. There’s something kind of sampled and choppy to it.”

Hansen originally wrote “Devices” for a film soundtrack; it ended up on the cutting room floor, but Hansen thought to revisit it. For him, the track evokes moving to downtown Sacramento in the late ‘90s, as he fell in love with electronic music and got his creative bearings.

“A couple of my first synths were trance-centric,” Hansen recalls of those early days. “I wanted to reference them in some way without literally making a song like that.”

“Infinite Health” features chopped-up drum breaks from the producer and drummer extraordinaire Kaelin Ellis. “I love how aggressive and over the top his drums can be, so that really inspired the song,” Hansen says, and he crafted an ever-shifting, psychedelic voyage against Ellis’ inspired racket.

The gorgeous, downtempo “Green” is of utmost personal significance to Hansen — it evokes the American River, which he grew up near. “That’s a really nostalgic, kind of meaningful song for me,” Hansen says, adding that his guitar-based compositions list toward introspection.

“DX Odyssey” drew inspiration from rubbery ‘70s funk, and applied it to synth and analog bass alike. “It jumps back and forth between those,” Hansen says. “That’s an homage to all the ‘90s downtempo stuff that got me into electronic music.”

The penultimate track, “Totem,” also grew from jam sessions between Hansen and Brown. “The original production concept was to do a Daft Punk, kind of Justice-ish thing with the filtering, anf that kind of French house vibe,” Hansen says. “That’s why you hear that high-pass bassline at the beginning — and then the filter turns off, and it all opens up.”

Tycho’s 2006 debut album was titled Past is Prologue, so it’s awfully poignant that Infinite Health’s final track is titled “Epilogue.”

“The album was coming to a close — you work on these tracks for so long, and you’re hearing the same song over and over again, and you’re stressing on the details, and you aren’t really hearing the thing for what it is,” Hansen says. When he took a much-deserved break, this immersive song flowed out.

Clearly, this “epilogue” isn’t a full stop, but a gateway to future adventures — and Infinite Health is your waystation to a brave new world for Tycho. After more than two decades, Hansen’s still at the vanguard of electronic music — with so much more to say through his samplers and synths.

Releases

Tycho