Mi and L’Au return with new album

More than two decades into their journey, Mi and L’Au remain almost impossible to label or pin down, existing somewhere between musicians, visual artists and adventurous experimenters. Since the release of their self-titled debut record on Young God Records twenty years ago, their path has played out like a series of shifting environments, each one leaving its imprint on how they create, record and understand sound.

Movement has always defined Mi and L’Au; years of touring across the US and Europe established their reputation in performance, but their work has never stayed confined to one format. By 2009, while in Valencia, they released Good Morning Jokers, followed by If Beauty Is A Crime in Paris in 2012 and H20 the following year, both with the Alter.k imprint. Each release feels tied to place as much as process, shaped by the surroundings in which it was made. That same context extends beyond music, with the duo also staging exhibitions of drawings, photographs, sculptures and ceramics, suggesting a practice that sees no boundary between sound and image.

By 2016, Four Pair Of Wings arrived from a cabin in Finland, a setting that hints at a quieter, more isolated creative moment. But stability has never been a constant and in 2018, their apartment burned down, an event that disrupted not only their lives but their understanding of sound itself. The noises they heard during that time felt impossible to recreate using traditional instruments. That realisation led them toward a different approach when they picked up a sampler and stepped outside, beginning to record the world directly. What followed was Nutrisco & Extinguo, an electronic album born from sound design and environmental capture rather than conventional composition.

That shift opened a new chapter that continued to develop as the world changed again. During the period of empty streets brought on by the global pandemic, they walked daily, absorbing a different kind of silence and out of that time came Lenkki in 2022, another electronic work shaped by its surroundings. But even as distance defined that moment, their focus extended outward. They collaborated with their friend Antti Valta on the magazine KEPPI HEPPO, inviting Finnish artists to contribute and distributing 2500 copies across Helsinki. It became another form of connection, a way of creating community even when physical presence wasn’t possible.

Now, with the pace of the world accelerating again, Mi and L’Au return with REC, their latest full-length project. The album begins with something deceptively simple, an electric ukulele discovered by Mira, paired with L’Au’s reversed firebird. From there, the process progresses through touch and material, through the interaction between wood, electricity, shapes and resonance. It’s a reminder that for them, instruments are not fixed objects but starting points, tools waiting to be redefined.

REC itself is built around the idea of recording as both action and concept, it looks at the act of capturing sound not just as documentation, but as transformation. The details that might go unnoticed in a wider panorama become central, the small nuances that shape how something is heard and understood. From the delicate flicker of instrumental tones on opening track “Wild People,” the album flows from a dreamy alternative folk scene with whispered vocals and immersive arrangement.

“Lullaby” pairs sparse guitar notes with alluring vocal layers, casting a spellbinding musical moment full of blissful melodies and drifting sonic textures wrapped in an absorbing atmosphere. Tracks like “Down by the shelter” pair laid back tones of piano and smokey aesthetic as their dual vocals float above with heartfelt lyricism and tender performance. “What it means to be free” crafts a mesmeric soundscape where the steady march of muted guitar notes and melancholic vocal work forms an emotive sound that’s memorable and meaningful in equal measure.

Closing the album with “The Dove,” a stripped back arrangement of soft instrumental tones and breathy vocals presents a minimal but highly affecting finale to their stellar new LP. With REC, Mi and L’Au continue to move forward without settling, treating each project as a new space to explore rather than a continuation of what came before.

Listen to REC below