This week’s Study Album of the Week was written by Bill Riley. Cool beans.

This week we have a self titled album by Hectic Zeniths.  Now, when I first heard this gem of a music back around thanksgiving, I was in the backseat thinking Thomas had found The Log.os’ new album.  I was genuinely surprised to find a pretty young thing like Hectic Zeniths.  Now, the name can be weird to say, okay, so let’s practice saying it out loud a couple times before you yell at all your hipster friends about it.

Hectors… Xena ass… I’m really glad you’re just a coffee cup…

The name is actually a pretty big turn on once you know it’s an anagram for the German word “Zeitschichten,” which means “Layers of Time.” It’s a kind of handshake for your ears; This is me and what you will be experiencing.  Because the LAYERS and the COMPLEXITY is so well done here.

Okay, let’s talk technical for a moment.  Every song on this album has a really good vibe to it, it’s the perfect study album. Let’s compare it to a few past study guide posts: DJ Krush with less hip hop and some extra atmosphere.  Helios with more hip hip and sampling.  There’s no article for it, but the aforementioned The Log.os album called λόγος.

A couple of my favorite tracks:

• “Then and Now” starts with a beautifully catchy piano riff. The use of sampling is so elegantly woven into this track that I pretty much man-cried the first time I heard it.
• “I Might Drown” is so well done… honestly, this album is worth buying simply for this song alone.

Hectic Zeniths’ self-titled debut is out now – grab it on Bandcamp.