One of Amsterdams most diverse soul-drenched artists LYMA goes deeply inwards on his latest project. The album tells the story of loss, letting go of past experiences and transforming the dark into the light. It's his most melancholic output to date.
Tjerk Lammers (31) is the name he uses by day but when the glow of the moon falls upon us, the artist LYMA arises.
Prior to the release of his 2019 debut EP 'In Between Shifts' he spent a lot of his time as a hermit in the studio-cave carefully honing his craft as a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter & producer. Another vital ingredient in his palette is the ability to mix his own music up to the deepest details. His ears were trained for that during an internship at the infamous Flowriders Studio. Here Tjerk was taken under the wings of Vincent Helbers aka Seravince, which also resulted in an album named 'Junk Food'.
Right from the start in his career it was pretty clear that his sound sits somewhere between soul, hiphop, electronic music & beyond, but never fully fits into any of those. The soca-inspired track 'Fading' is an excellent example of that. His adventurous vision and openness to collaborate surely knows no boundaries.
Last year LYMA's smooth-as-velvet vocals featured on local brass-heroes Gallowstreet's third album 'Our Dear Metropolis' and graced two tracks on there. He was supposed to do a national tour with them but that ended abruptly after the first few gigs due to the arrival of the on-going Covid nightmare. This got him motivated to dive back into the studio and use all his time & energy to create and finish earlier started ideas.
Such as last years joined project '428' with Steve Biko & Lucas Mens, which included the afro-tinged feel-good track 'Sitaki'. If there would've been a summer filled with the usual festivals, then I'm sure this tune would be on plenty of DJs playlists. It should be.
His diverse body of work sometimes reminds me of artists like Steve Spacek, Taylor McFerrin or Jordan Rakei. Not because he sounds like them, he doesn't, but because he developed his own brand of electronic soul. Just as they did.
With the release of this melancholic album he takes us into the dark depths of his soul and right back into the light at the end of it. Along the way it's a real journey through minor chords, searing synths, off-centre drums and chopped up vocal samples under guidance of his stellar songwriting & soothing voice.
In his own words:
"When you have lost someone, when you have witnessed someone lose themselves and when you have lost oneself in someone else, that can often make you feel like you're doing the opposite of letting go. But now I'm trying to turn my moon back into a sun. So I am once more looking at every aspect of the dark, in order to find the light.”
Thankfully he found that light in the process of this albums creation and it's presented to be taken in by us all. 'When Sun Turns Moon' is out now on all digital platforms, vinyl & cd!
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