This album by Marcus D is the instrumental version of Melancholy Hopeful, which I haven't listened to. Marcus D is a US musician currently based in Tokyo, influenced by Nujabes. Thus it's no wonder this album is chillhop/lofi.

This is one of my first experience with lofi and I find it quite nice. The tracks feature different instruments, and are quite diverse in this regard. However they all fit the same aesthetic. This is quite unsurprising, given the influences. They feature cozy melodies, played on the piano, saxophone, trumpet or oboe, on which is layered some other parts, most notably a rythm track which sometimes feel like some drum'n'bass.

We begin the album by a fusion of a bit of jazz and drum'n'bass. It helps getting in the mood quite efficiently.

My favourite track, the one with which I've discovered the album, is Third Person. It features piano and some cracking sounds, to give it a more "nostalgic" vibe. I don't know what makes it feel so special to me compared to the others, but I really enjoy listening to it.

The track giving its name to the album features both a soothing melody, with some parts played on the guitar, and a hypnotizing rhythmics. The rest of the album, while being entirely chillhop, is still diverse. There is some trumpet in Fly, which gives this one a more dynamic feeling. In Deep Breeze Interlude, we've got some flute. And what about Inasense and it's expressive saxophone ? As for Pain and Possibility, there is some oboe which gives it a real sense of depth, alongside an orchestral touch. And juste like the title, Melancholy Hopeful, these words evoke the balance between negative feelings and the positive one. And this balance can be found in the rest of the musics, and I think it's achieved nicely.

Marcus D also has a Patreon, Spotify page, Twitter account and Twitch account.