When I've played any of the tracks from Love Mysterious in public, those inquiring whom the artist is often seem surprised it's Kaskade. But after a few more seconds of listening with that garnered knowledge, the inquirers often nod and cede, "Oh, yeah. I can see that." Which in short sums up the essence of this record: it's Kaskade, but he's progressing as an artist.
Songs with more of a pop writing sensibility dominate Love Mysterious. They're still all pretty much with the house downbeat and have the melancholy keyboard chords indigenous to Kaskade's fingers, but there's more pushing beyond the producer's usual formula. "Be Still" and "4am" are examples of tracks that could've fit stylistically on Imogen Heap's Speak For Yourself. They have the layered female vocals run through trippy filters and intense melody structures that eventually hit a euphoric fat sound at some point in the song. The production here is a bit more slick than that of Heap's said work, but it's a compliment to her and will be a pleasure to her fans nonetheless. "Sorry" might be the "Stepin' Out" of the year, with its beautiful reconciling nature both in melody and lyrics that is destined to be many lovers' song of 2006.
If this album as a whole might remind the listener of any other recent records not yet mentioned, it would probably be Andy Caldwell's Universal Truth, which makes sense given that Caldwell is Love Mysterious' producer. But this record it not an electro house really; just a Kaskade record whose fingers are entwined with the guiding hand of Caldwell.
