Like much of Mad Decent’s output, any two minutes of To Syria, With Love sampled at random sound fantastic – an aural peephole into the most exciting party on the planet. However, a mountain range would never be beautiful if it consisted entirely of peaks, and the same is true of Syrian folk-techno albums. The unrelenting tail-thump beat flattens an initial dynamism into a tiring, trebly melange, and Omar Souleyman’s emotional voice begins to hector rather than implore. The impassioned ballad Mawal stands out as a contemplative reprieve, but it isn’t anywhere near enough to rescue the album.
