Aiming for the sky is one thing. A wheels-up, vertical blast towards the surface of the sun is a whole ‘nother matter. So when Fuck Buttons leave Earth during the first two minutes of Tarot Sport, flames whipping around some metronomic, post-rave kick drum, it’s with zero negotiation. Luckily for you, the departure is shrouded in warmth and comes packaged with all the hope in the world that you’ll be leaving along with them. Some May’ve cowered and cringed at Fuck Buttons’ debut Street Horssing, with it’s periodical blown-out thrash vocals, clawing their way through sheets of white distortion. And not without some gorgeous, star-gazing moments, Street Horssing was undoubtedly a more confrontational record than their latest. Completely gone now are the in-the-red vocals or the menacing, village-torching riffage. Without a single pause, the duo of Andrew Hung & Benjamin John Power spend Tarot Sport’s hour-long run time perfecting some new kind of shimmering, multi-hued electro that shifts, retracts and evolves into a ride inexpressibly prismatic.

With ease, an entire review could be written about Tarot Sport’s two devastating centerpieces “The Lisbon Maru” and follow-up counterpart “Olympians,” which casually float past the 20-minute mark together. Opening with a headphone-swirling ambiance, “Lisbon” moves with a muted gallop until, without warning, you’re dropped off the cliff you didn’t know existed. The next eight minutes are spent in free-fall: keyboard chimes bouncing off a massive wheels of looped, processed guitars, held up with the support of a gravity slowed. With “Lisbon” eventually drifting way on down, “Olympians” fulfills it’s title — swooping through in double-time, building endless layers of synthetic wash until they all let go, revealing not only a heart-aching piano melody but something more profound: the reality that at its core, Tarot Sport goes far beyond it’s sonically daunting reaches and succeeds at being a deeply emotional experience. Often is the case when so far up, on level with the clouds, looking back down and watching the recognizable transform into obscured remnants of geometry.

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