About

The training came first. Sweeney studied music in Dublin, and then at the Royal Academy of Music in London: years of counterpoint and repertoire, and an instrument older than the orchestra itself. The lute never quite left. Neither did the guitar, acoustic or electric.

But synthesizers win. They always win. There is a particular pleasure in a stacked saw wave at two in the morning that no amount of conservatoire discipline can argue with — and Autolumen is what happens when that pleasure stops being a guilty one.

The result is synthwave, pure and simple: neon, analogue warmth, and melodies built to lodge somewhere behind the eyes. Music made by someone who learned it the long way round, remembering one decade from the other side of Europe.