in order to develop ideas he was having while recording the record, it was necessary for him to have more control of the effects and instruments he was using for the album. Making the album helped him learn how to create synth sounds and become a "gear geek", instead of relying on presets as he did with his previous works. He said that "the more tedious aspects of production do have the capacity to take the wind out of your sails, so you always have to navigate through that as quickly as you can before you start feeling burnt on the song, before you forget that initial spark that made you even want to write it in the first place". The title plays with the different meanings of the word "extraña": although it directly translates into "strange", it also means to "command the act of longing". Composition Era Extraña is significantly influenced by psychedelic pop, shoegaze, and new wave. Clash reviewer Nick Levine described the album as a loud indietronica record and "chillwave that's not actually that, well, chilled", joking that its genre should be marked as "drillwave". The instrumentation is cluttered with unsteady synth arrangements, as well as stray sounds of rocket-ship noises, phone conversations, laser sounds, and visceral samples of video games, but the music still manages to be tight. As Drowned in Sound reviewer Robert Cooke explained, the retro video game samples are used as "incidental noise, or miniature musical experiments", and Era Extraña also includes the "sparkling synths and wide-eyed wonder" of M83's more pop-sounding material that makes it sound like "a soundtrack for an Eighties teen movie about surfers from space" rather than just "Nintendo-sponsored masturbation". Spin reviewer Nick Murray also compared some of the songs to M83, while describing other tracks as "one Martin Rushent assist away from being genuine synth-pop hits". Era Extraña has the same "lazy summer feel" as Psychic Chasms, but with a more serious and slightly darker tone. In a PopMatters review, Nathan Wisnicki said that Palomo's introversion is "certainly apparent", citing that even the album's most joyful melodies are "rigidly grafted to both rhythmic thrust and hooks more anxious than comfortable". Pitchforks Larry Fitzmaurice said that the album is much more serious than Psychic Chasms, but "Palomo isn't always as assured in rendering the darker material". He also noted that while Era Extraña is not exactly a breakup album,