Lil Fish is a producer from Montpellier, France, who released his first LP, Fusion, back in 2016 on The French Touch Connection. That album was largely about collaboration and featured a lot of guest artists as a result. His latest effort, an EP by the name of Mosaic, is a short and focused instrumental release that is all Lil Fish.

One of the interesting aspects of Lil Fish doing an EP like this is hearing how doing an EP as opposed to an LP allows him the freedom to experiment in one particular vein. On Fusion, Lil Fish had all sorts of things to balance, from all of the guest artists, to just trying to present himself as a producer who could successfully pull off a full-length album. On Mosaic, Lil Fish frees himself up by saying, “Here are five tracks in this style that I want to experiment with.” The style in question here is one of high energy, sounding like this whole project was developed with live performance in mind, because it hits hard with a manic combination of drums and volume right from the start and doesn’t let up until it ends. This is all fine as it is, but where the EP really gets interesting is how Lil Fish looks globally for inspiration for variety between tracks. This could mean some classical music from Southeast Asia, it could mean some symphonic pop from Bollywood, or it could be something like house or dub. It’s all on the table here, but it’s all married under this umbrella of aggressive big beats and high energy that’s present from start to finish across the EP. It’s an intense listen, but one that’s not without its subtleties as well.

Lil Fish is still finding his niche as a solo artist, but this EP will go a ways in helping him find his voice. It’s short and it’s intense, but it also opens up some interesting possibilities for him as a producer. I’ll be curious to see where he goes from here.