With its starkly minimal and abstract atmospherics, Slowdive’s Pygmalion was a far cry from the heavenly shoegaze of Just for a Day and Souvlaki. It was as if Neil Halstead had read the writing on the wall, knew the zeitgeist was about to throw shoegaze bands like his under the bus in favor of Britpop, and decided to say “Screw it” and fully embrace his love for Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works Volume II.

For folks expecting the bliss of, say, “Catch the Breeze” or “Alison,” Pygmalion opener “Rutti” was quite the head scratcher. Consisting of ten minutes of languid guitars, loping bass lines, echoing vocals, and cryptic lyrics about “the soul of you” and “the water of me,” “Rutti” is certainly atmospheric — but it’s not shoegaze in any classic sense of the term. Rather, it feels more like a zen koan than a song, a meditative piece that makes you feel increasingly mindful with each passing minute.