Posts Tagged ‘ abstract ’
While admittedly a pricey collection, this is a real gem of a package. It was originally put out as a free / donation-based digital only album, but happily (perhaps due to strong listener response) Legowelt has self-released the beautiful, rough, personal recordings in vinyl package. Danny Wolfers describes the original project thusly: “Ok people here [ READ MORE ]
The dark horse series “Vanguard Sound” has been establishing an aesthetic of gritty, almost militant house music. The sound here straddles the range of haunted acid, industrial electro, jack, and techno. Amir Alexander‘s imprint continues the trend with its third 12″. As usual for the series, the tracks are varied and strong. DJ Spider’s Tribal [ READ MORE ]
Robert Henke’s Monolake project continues to expand, develop, and explore the dark, clinically precise sounds and structures that he has been known for throughout his long career as musician. While he’s been highly regarded for his work outside of the realm of a studio artist, notably for his roles as an educator and his impressive [ READ MORE ]
Fans of strange and beautiful house should be on the look-out as Atavisme has issued represses of French mastermind Pepe Bradock‘s Pistes Insolites series along with his Path Of Most Resistance 12″. While these aren’t as well-known as his earlier classic, Deep Burnt, they’re every bit as well-conceived, frequently delve into more idiosyncratic oddities, and are of [ READ MORE ]
For a genre steeped in masks, aliases and anonymity from its onset, it’s impressive just how exceptionally enigmatic the duo behind Drexciya were among their Detroit techno contemporaries. Blending science fiction, mythology and, um, marine physics and biology, the pair crafted vivid portraits of a universe deep within the sea that came across like Bladerunner [ READ MORE ]
Prolific Chicago-based producer & multiple-label owner Hakim Murphy releases his latest full length on his own Machining Dreams imprint. “There is just yourself, thoughts, and phrases” he blurrily imparts in the album’s opening monologue, before launching into his characteristically stark yet warm dry beat craft. He has slowed things down for this collection, and tempo [ READ MORE ]
Clocking in at around 120bpm on both sides, Actress may be using only the very most liberal definition of house music as a parameter on this two tracker. The A-side, assumed as the title track, is devoid of any percussive elements. Rainy Dub is populated exclusively by a squeaky midrange bassline that varies between a [ READ MORE ]
Jan Jelinek has finally re-emerged after a half-decade hiatus from his Farben project. His new releases on the Faitiche imprint stick to his ethos of rigorous sample mining and re-contextualization, but update his previously microhouse sound to the increasingly weird, slow-motion, and bass-oriented palette of recent years. This latest 12″, his second on the imprint, [ READ MORE ]
Alva Noto mastermind and Raster-Noton cohort Carsten Nicolai doesn’t seem to be mellowing with age. On the contrary, his spectacular live sets have become increasingly visceral and abrasive, reflecting a frequently similar drift in the Raster-Noton catalog. In line with this shift, Univers is an album of precise tones and atomized sound design, mostly in [ READ MORE ]
This mini-album from dubstep, downtempo, singer-songwriter impressario James Blake expands on the vocal & acoustic-hybrid efforts he explored on an acclaimed self-titled full-length. For about half the album, he sticks to barely processed piano and vocals, his singing sometimes with shades of Antony Hegarty falsetto. Here and there he still adds electronic flourishes, as on the [ READ MORE ]
Frigio records founder Juanpablo opens Mother Mountain with a collaboration with Chicago’s Josh Werner. A reverberating gonzo acid track with murmured vocals and ascending arpeggios, the title track is a science fiction experiment. Sea People follows this with a straighter industrial acid-house groove over conspiratorial vocals and a slow build of twinkling keys. The flip [ READ MORE ]
Somewhat of an originator when it came to this loose, sample-heavy, slowed-down house groove (Gerry Read, Youandewan, Red Rack’em, etc), Falty DL returns on the mighty Ninja Tune and re-establishes his mastery of the art. While it’s not as frenzied as some of his album work, the music here is characterized by a constant motion [ READ MORE ]
Second release for the fledgling Inimeg sticks to the plan: futuristic melancholy label art paired with three tracks from Joey Anderson and an underground heavy-hitter cameo. On the first release, the special appearance was from DJ Qu, this time around it’s Jus Ed. And as in the last edition, the high quality is consistent throughout [ READ MORE ]
Plaid are still off in their own exquisite world. They seem to have invented a personal language, and continue to develop its vocabulary through this latest, long-awaited full-length. In the half-decade since their last WARP releases they have provided feature film soundtracks for Heaven’s Door and Tekkonkinkreet and this may have helped to further develop [ READ MORE ]
Only the third artist to have an album released on Jamal Moss’ Mathematics imprint (not counting those under The Sun God‘s various aliases), John Heckle more than meets the high expectations involved. The album’s strength lies in its ability to jump from one style to another while remaining confident and commanding. On “The Charge,” “The [ READ MORE ]
Brendon Moeller, recording here under his more frequently techno-oriented Echologist alter-ego, releases the first album on his own Steadfast imprint. Subterranean is groundbreaking. It is immersive, experimental, textural journey. Through it, the artist has seemingly distilled his techno work to solely the atmospheric elements. This process is most transparent on tracks like “Slowburn (Filter Dub)” [ READ MORE ]
The strange acronym here stands for the collaboration between Manuel Gonzales and Wild Oats owner Kyle Hall. Of the tracks here, 3 of them sound to me like they could have been rough-sketch versions of Kyle Hall’s Must See EP for Third Ear. They’re handy with the rough-and-ready swung percussion, quick cut edits, and boomy [ READ MORE ]
This is an exuberant, imaginative collection from Aybee‘s DeepBlak, a label recently revitalized as a vinyl imprint. Culled from a full-length digital album of the same name, the key to Means and Ways is its syncopation: the drum programming is frequently shifting between modes, switching back and forth from one motif into another. The music [ READ MORE ]
Hieroglyphic Being is recording as IAMTHATIAM on this hypnotic EP. When he describes his music as “new-age house,” I think that the music here is what he’s talking about. The title track sounds as much indebted to Gamelan music as to any notion of modern club-oriented house music. A Day Trip Through Divination is a [ READ MORE ]
Another new find by Mathematics A&R Jamal Moss, and there doesn’t seem to be much information floating around about her, him, them yet. But while the artist(s) behind the music are mysterious here, the music has incontrovertible roots in Chicago house and early Detroit techno. The EP has a certain Mediterranean flair to its classicism, [ READ MORE ]