Majical Cloudz is centered around Montreal songwriter Devon Welsh, who joined with Matthew Otto to collaboratively produce and perform his songs.

In May 2012, Majical Cloudz released II, an album of Welsh’s vocal melodies largely buried under impressionistic synths, loops, samples, and snippets. The album was followed in December by the Turns Turns Turns EP, an audacious distillation of Welsh’s ideas that brought his vocals to the fore. “Musically, I wanted to try saying ‘no’ to possibilities, and create negative space in the songs,” he says. “To put the emphasis on the voice and lyrics.”

Pitchfork said the EP “trusts in simple pop melodies and never feels a need to obscure the most enjoyable elements of these songs.” (The song “What That Was” was named Best New Track.)