James Blake presents a very genuine and abstract musical composition in The Colour in Anything – always full of character but never chained by style. The album is best heard listened through as a whole; falsetto vocals, dark watercolor-like pad textures, and massive synths groove together through both polyrhythmic and highly melodic segments that form a very aurally interesting album.

Notably, Blake traces his polyrhythmic and synthetic influence back to the much less chill genre of old Drum & Bass – he samples Acen’s Trip II the Moon in his track Choose Me. This interesting reinterpretation of good music into a new style is a mark of good abstract thinking and creative musicianship. In this way, Blake blends naturalism and heavy synthesis in a way better than any preceding record.