Reviews

Album Review: Machinedrum / ‘Vapor City’ (Ninja Tune)

Matt Oliver Leave a Comment

Machinedrum Vapor City

★★★☆☆

Vapor City accurately pinpoints a post-fallout environment powered by quicksilver scurries and reverbs decorating requiems in dub and bass. Like skimming a blimp across a lake, Travis Stewart’s IQ in dynamics and hydraulics gives the bulky and burdened a frothy quality in subzero.

Sustaining junctions in post-dubstep, footwork/juke, and jungle/hardcore, “Infinite Us” is near enough jungle jazz/intelligence from the 90s, and “Don’t 1 2 Lose U” plays at being Zomby, rave chords picking at the brickwork of a mausoleum. Provocative to a point in rigidly setting out chord structures and triggers, Stewart’s highs tunnelling towards daylight, referee face-offs between the restful and the unsettling, skeletal against billowing. “Center You Love” very nearly aims dubstep for the coffee table, where the atmospheric shaping of layers, hazing and fading on the timeout “Vizion”, close eyes in the infinite space between club and headphone while tugging at the throttle.

With a longing glance at Hyperdub-style electro/R&B on “U Still Lie”, any moments of tension have a way of nixing themselves, and predicted dirges – jump-off “Eyesdontlie” one to fix an unflinching gaze – end up wearing a daisy chain in a world, despite so many signposts, that’s easy to get lost in. When it comes to the continuity of Room(s), the ubiquitous pitched down vocal saps some of the excitement, and similar still, for all its undeniable cutting edge, somehow it doesn’t quite feel it’s doing enough to pull away from its peers.

File under: Sepalcure, Burial, Benton

Compilation Review: ‘The Mix Collection – Tiefschwarz’ (Renaissance)

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Renaissance-The-Mix-Collection-Tiefschwarz

★★★★☆

Hail to the latest Tiefschwarz weight loss program — you’re always bound to sweat off a few kilos in their deep house gym, though this is a straighter, narrower circuit compared to the sometime off-the-cuff kinks of say, Chocolate. Between their customary furrows through the night (Dischords) and teasers of beats lighter on their feet (Axel Boman’s “Cubic Mouth”), your schedule finds the sweeter scents of Eric Volta & Jonny Cruz and the almost inevitable appearance of Koze’s “Royal Asscher Cut,” amidst travels through synth pop provocations. Ewan Pearson acts on behalf of Bachar Mar-Khalife, and Michael Mayer plays hard nosed yet immaculately manicured. Knox’s offer of a lovingly weightless there-there, as Ali & Basti roll in blue grass, approves the mix’s unity under disco lights (or lack of them).

Though the burn you feel is not a trial by hot coals, Martinez & Carballo will sound better if you get your head down. Tiefschwarz’ “Voices” and Elon’s “Andres” test you as the mix’s mugginess starts to rise and drowsiness drifts in time with fluctuating blood sugar levels, and the gritted teeth of Kenny Leaven wants your all or nothing. Put work in and thou shalt be rewarded – those rewards being Dyed Soundorom’s immaculate swing jacker, Sonodab’s funky worm, and more synth turns through constellations. Tiefschwarz’ turning of the reps up and down gets you plenty of variation subtly locking together the transparent and translucent.

File under: Tale of Us, Mathew Jonson, Isolee

Album Review: Neosignal / ‘Raum und Zeit’ (Division)

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Neosignal Raum und Zeit

★★★☆☆

Drum ‘n’ bass heads Phace & Misanthrop look to cash in on dubstep’s divergence by going all prog rock about it and putting the jump into jumpsuit. A very different kind of dubstep drama, stepping up to a theatrically flashbacked, keyboard-is-king plate, if bro-step was the gnarly, horns-making frat, Florian Harres and Michael Bräuninger have the keys to the school of performing arts next door with its own comic book kiosk.

Smoke machines blaring from the off, Neosignal take measure of ’80s Spandex, create blockbuster builds-up and board post-D&B guitar chugs before voyaging off into a galaxy you imagine is situated just past France. At times it’s an abnormal, audacious playing of kitsch epics against the rock-hard. Horsepower butting with unicorns, “Planet Online” and “Dernier Cri” get close to minimising the gap with electro chargers well set to occupy both sides of a fence that “Kein Signal” looks to blow to pieces. “Sequenz” and “1000 Volt” twist bass power boosts to interrupt playing at rock gods, “Temptation” is but one head-banger whipping a German glam metal mane, and “Kosmos” does in-flight electro entertainment, with the light show to match, for UFOs to descend to.

In a time when a pair of robot rockers has sent the music press spinning, Neosignal are getting high off their vapors. Live on stage it has the promise to be spectacular, the reviews sure to range from spectacular to WTF? That’s entertainment.

File under: Karl Bartos, Justice, Housse de Racket

Compilation Review: Tosca / ‘Tlapa – The Odeon Remixes’ (!K7)

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Tlapa - The Odeon Remixes

★★★☆☆

When the original has been described as a work that puts its progenitors “in the maverick category,” upon being called up for the remix package, do you go like for like and play the rebels at their own game, try and straighten out the eccentricities to get them on your team, or just go about your own business to let them know who this project is really about?

Richard Dorfmeister and Rupert Huber are now seated for deep house and cosmic disco (“Meixner” again taking to the highway), measuring gilt-edged lushness and a look-ahead tightening of dancing shoes, all with a little loftiness carried over by an international cast. Dorfmeister’s own head to head with Madrid de Los Austrias means jazzy stepping out of bed comes with a little less stubble, taking a shine to a drifter donning top hat and tails, and there are even footnotes made within new supplements as Brendon Moeller betters himself as Beat Pharmacy to claim extra credit for “Bonjour,” with a dance floor study approaching odyssey status.

Whereas sombreness seemed to intrude on the source, there’s larger uplift second time around, without it being a facelift finishing in a manic grin. Though the AGF reformation of “Cavallo” displays a impatience that breaks up the original, “JayJay” in particular sounds more wide awake when taken care of first by Stefane Lefrancois, then with Makossa and Megablast rechanneling its pseudo-goth energy. In conclusion, all of the above.

File under: Rodney Hunter, Rainer Truby, Joyce Muniz