Wild Swim

J.Bernardt, the alter ego of Jinte Deprez (Balthazar), returns with third album Wild Swim that sits somewhere between a full- throttle lust for life and a kind of euphoric nihilism. Picture Jinte striding through Los Angeles in a blazing suit, like he’s auditioning for his own midlife crisis. A guy from Belgium suddenly deciding subtlety might be overrated, that sometimes the stories you tell about yourself hold more truth than the actual facts of your life. The result is a record that feels like liberation: wild, warm and bursting with life.

 Musically, J.Bernardt stretches further than ever. His signature is still there, but stretches into something retro-futuristic, with Motown-inspired backing vocals as a thrilling counterpoint to his vibrato. Paul Butler (Michael Kiwanuka, Devendra Banhart)’s kaleidoscopic production makes it feel as if every window in J.Bernardt’s mind has been thrown open at once. The record is funky, euphoric and reckless all at once.

 A sense of liberation runs through the lyrics, too. Where his previous records were explicitly personal, Jinte reaches here for something more universal, what he calls “a celebration of life’s complete randomness.” He insists that everything can be beautiful, difficult, and arbitrary all at once. That this feels like a departure from the weight of his earlier work makes total sense to him: “After the wreckage of a breakup, eventually you reach the point where you can see the humour in life again.