Gorillaz - The Fall (Kayfabe Review)

Parlaphone: 2010

Essentially a 2-D solo album, but I doubt there'd be much interest in that, so it makes sense he'd release it under the Gorillaz banner. It's remarkable he got it out at all. I thought Murdoc held all the rights to the Gorillaz brand, including what gets officially released under the name. And probably bootlegged for that matter – I can totally see Mr. Niccals working the black market for Gorillaz merch alongside everything else. “BUY! Authentic Rubbish From The Shores Of Plastic Beach!” “TASTE! Bottled Brine From The Bay Of Point Nemo!”

Murdoc's easily distracted though, what with his copious drug and drinking abuses, plus debt collectors, demons, and record executives constantly at his back. So it's not that surprising 2-D could write, record, and release an album all on his own completely under Mr. Niccals' broken nose while they were touring the Plastic Beach album – Murdoc spent much of that time bitching about the Gorillaz Live Band stealing his spotlight anyway. And if you think 2-D showing such initiative flies in the face of established Gorillaz lore, how dare you break kayfabe while reading this review! Despite coming off a simpleton and full of innocent naivety, Stuart Pot has shown smarts in the past, when called upon. His traumatic experience surrounding the Plastic Beach sessions clearly gave him some backbone in standing up to Murdoc, and if releasing a solo album while on tour under the Gorillaz brand was his way of getting back at the “bastard bass player”, all the more power to him.

That all said, it's hard getting into The Fall as a proper Gorillaz record. Even if previous albums were primarily written by lone members (ie: Noodle almost single-handily making Demon Days), at least everyone was involved. Hell, even Plastic Beach, despite lacking Noodle and Russel Hobbs, at least used elements of their talents to make it sound distinctly Gorillaz. True, Murdoc used some right shady tactics to achieve this (using DNA from Noodle to create a cyborg version of her; straight up taking Russel's drum equipment without his consent), but hey, par for the course where Mr. Niccals is concerned, amirite?

But nay, The Fall is primarily all 2-D, with assists from the Gorillaz Live Band wherever he could sneak them in. I've no doubt that Damon Albarn guy helped with some of the vocal overdubs, and a few musicians contributed as well (Mick Jones of The Clash adds a little guitar doodling to Hillbilly Man, Paul Simonon also of The Clash adds bass to Aspen Forest, Bobby Womack brings bluesy guitar and vocals for Bobby In Phoenix).

For the most part though, The Fall is 2-D making blippy, bloopy electro-pop and soul, finding inspiration from whatever city the band happened to be in during the tour. A strange concept for a solo album, but then it's not like 2-D had many options to explore his muse. Methinks he's the sort to find inspiration with whatever is immediately in front of him anyway.

Carbon Based Lifeforms - Interloper

Ultimae Records/Blood Music: 2010/2016

I didn’t think I’d ever get this album. Hear it at some point, sure, all of Carbon Based Lifeforms’ music available on streaming services now. Unlike their first two though, which Ultimae would re-issue in anticipation of a new CBL album coming out, Interloper only had its initial run. I’m not sure why they didn’t re-issue it with the release of CBL’s space ambient opus Twentythree - both Hydroponic Garden and World Of Sleepers were, with spiffy new cover art and everything. Maybe it was still relatively new, so hadn’t yet gone out of print like Ultimae’s older CDs? It wasn’t long before Interloper did sell out though, now commanding exorbitant prices on the open market. And since it seems unlikely Ultimae will re-issue any of their old catalog on CD again, yeah, I had resigned myself to having Interloper missing from my collection.

Then I caught wind that CBL were re-issuing their first three albums on CD anyway, plus vinyl options too. Holy shit! For sure it wasn’t Ultimae doing it, and I doubt they could afford it on their own Leftfield Records print (that’s digital anyway). Nay, they turned to a nearby Scandinavian outlet that specializes in all manner of record distribution: Blood Music. Wait, the death metal outfit that’s given synthwave poster-boy Perturbator a home? I… I mean… that is… how in…? WORLDS COLLIDING!!

So now I got myself a CD copy of Interloper (care of Blood Music. Blood Music!), and I have to say this was not the album I was expecting. Given the original foggy cover art and CBL’s ongoing drift into more minimalist songcraft, I figured this album would be the logical step between World Of Sleepers and Twentythree. Not in the slightest. If anything, Interloper just might be the most ‘pop’ album in Ultimae’s history.

The duo has had its fair share of sublime melodies - MOS 6591 from their debut undoubtedly their peak – but it isn’t their defining trait. This album, though, has ear-wormy melodies to spare. The titular opener hits you with an immediate winner; Supersede sounds like elements of Epicentre (aka: the other memorable melodic track from their debut) were repurposed for a prog-psy groover; Frog has an overwrought twee melody that could be an ambient track on a Solarstone album; M seems to have movie credits in mind; and Polyrytmi, after a lengthy, subtle build, erupts at the end in such a way that would have even Solar Fields saying, “uh, maybe tone it back a bit.”

Examples of the downtempo acid-chill CBL are known for do exist between these big moments, some with a few new wrinkles added. Right Where It Ends, with its treated vocals and unconventional rhythm, wouldn’t sound out of place on L.S.G.’s Into Deep; Init and misleadingly titled 20 Minutes adds glitchy beats; but by and large obvious melodies dominate Interloper, with a few vocals thrown in for good measure. A handy introduction to CBL for associates not so inclined to the underground side of chill-out music, this.

Sounds From The Ground - The Maze

Waveform Records: 2010

It took nearly fifteen years, but Elliot Jones and Nick Woolfson had finally found a way to evolve their sounds from the gound. They had to have been itching for something new after all that time, but their craft with ambient dub was so skill, there wasn’t much need to mess with the formula. True, they did some nu-jazz and trip-hop explorations too, yet so did everyone else in the downtempo scene around the turn of the century, so their efforts mostly got lost in the glut. Perhaps that’s why they ended up back with Waveform Records shortly after, a sturdy, steady print with a small enough roster they wouldn’t be buried in the process. Only drawback may have been Waveform’s dedication to the spliff’d side of chill vibes, but Sounds From The Ground maneuvered those waters far better than most throughout the mid-‘00s, milking the style nearly up to our current decade.

As I said though, changes were afoot, required even. Waveform itself was moving ever so slowly into contemporary sounds found on the crusty festival circuit, new cats on the scene embracing digital production over the sample-heavy style of the ‘90s. After so many years doing the dubby trip-hop thing, Sounds From The Ground finally embraced a comparatively ‘plastic’ aesthetic as well. The Maze was their first effort in this bold new realm of psy-dub electro!

Whoa, wait, that’s way too much overselling for this album. Its different compared to their prior work, but on a song-writing level, not that much different. There’s still an undeniable sense of dub groove Sounds From The Ground navigate with ease throughout, sections still filled with floating chill-out bliss (Temple Steps, Midnight Crossing, ambient leaning Afterglow), plus room for excursions into oddball electro explorations (Delphine, Acid Cornflats). Though never the hookiest of music makers, Jones and Woolfson come up with a couple nifty earworms befitting their legacy (A Thousand Colours features a lovely little swaying melody with its dub groove, This Land works in a grumbly, gritty bassline that has me wondering if the duo were feeling the dubstep itch as well). And just in case you still craved some of their jazzy influences, The Lenox gets some of that lounge vibe going with muted trumpets and spritely keyboards jamming alongside chill acid. Also, is it just me, or does the title of this song have you imagining Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax, but staring Annie Lennox in the titular role? What a bizarre book that would have made, featuring an androgynous synth-pop singer over a grumpy Wilfred Brimley stand-in. Future consideration for the 2071 100th Anniversary reboot!

And that’s about it for The Maze. Like so many Sounds From The Ground albums, there’s little at fault with their songcraft, though if you don’t fancy the dubby side of downtempo chill music, you probably won’t be fussed with this album. Still, in adapting a few new tricks to their trade, The Maze is one of the higher recommendations in their discography.

Gel-Sol - K8ema

Psychonavigation Records: 2010

I've already used up all my Gel-Sol background preamble and tasty tidbits of trivia in the review of IZ. What else is there to talk about regarding Mr. Reichel? This is the reason I'm going through my music collection in 'Album' alphabetical order, to keep each review relatively fresh and unique without falling into repetitive grinds. Typically I have enough time and space between artist albums that I'll have dug up some new details about their career, or find a fresh angle to approach a review from. And had I had both IZ and K8ema when they were new, I wouldn’t have this problem now, an entire letter buffering me between the two albums. Right, that letter is ‘J’, the puniest letters in my collection not named ‘Q’, but at least it’d be something. Man, why couldn’t I have stumbled upon Gel-Sol way back when. I had every opportunity to do so. But nay, tech-plodstep was more pressing to review in ye’ olde age of 2008.

Fortunately, the liner notes of K8ema have provided some details I wasn't privy to going into IZ. Yeah, yeah, maybe I should have read those before writing that review, but I'm trying to maintain the illusion of writing these shortly after I play 'em.

Anyhow, both of these albums were apparently written for Mr. Reichel’s nieces, IZ for an Izabella, and this here K8ema for one Katelyn Mae. D’aww. The first, I can hear, as IZ definitely had a lot of sentimentality flowing through its various ambient pieces. K8ema, on the other hand, is stated as a natural evolution of IZ, which means more interesting compositions, though not as much pleasantness little girls might like. In fact, this album is something of a mish-mash of various jam sessions Gel-Sol engaged with other Seattle producers, often using MIDI generators in crafting long, non-looping sequences of bleeps, zoops, diddlidoos, and other unpronounceable electronic sounds. Some tracks get very near musique concrete levels of non-musicality, but they always find a core of a theme to centre around. It’s a style of songcraft that isn’t too dissimilar to the abstract pieces Tangerine Dream were performing when they first started fiddling with synthesizers (and took me a stupid amount of time to realize that).

This helps make K8ema a more engaging playthrough than the uniformly similar IZ. You still have the pleasant synth pad pieces like Abyssinia, The Mechanical Garden, and Lost, but also sci-fi weirdness in tracks like Glade and Gel S’hole. Other pieces feel that krautrock psychedelic muse a’callin’ (Halo Of Stars, Energy Pools), while others aim for blissful peace vibes (Spirit Guide, Panta Rhei). And, just to remind you that this is a dedication to a wee waif, there’s an untitled final lullaby that sounds like it’s played on a electronic toy harpsichord. Double d’aww.

Really, the whole album plays out like one long song of various electronic improvisations, constantly fooling you where a‘proper’ track ends and begins. Fans of tripped-out FSOL definitely apply within.

Scuba - Sub:Stance

Ostgut Ton: 2010

Sub:Stance may as well be the turning point of Scuba's career, going from dubstep darling to tech-house tease. True, the hints didn't come to fruition for another couple years after this CD, but the very fact he's palling around with Ostgut Ton, they of Serious Technos Only acts like Surgeon, Shed, Klock, and Dettmann, had to give some signs of his future developments. Okay, there’s also the nugget of Mr. Rose hailing from Berlin, thus likely having ties with the Berghain posse regardless. It’s a pairing that was all but inevitable, what with Scuba's early techno dystopian approach to UK bass music.

What I find most interesting is that it was with Ostgut Ton that he made his commercial DJ mix CD debut in the first place. Why not do it on his own Hotflush print? Too many licensing issues? A friendly favour? Come to think of it, most of his mixes have been online efforts (podcasts, streamers, Boiler Room rinse-outs), this and DJ-Kicks about all he has for hard copy options (and a Mixmag offering, but who cares about those). Maybe he’ll do a Balance or fabric one soon, since he’s all about that house now.

In 2010 though, Mr. Rose was still mixing in the heady post-dubstep tuneage, with many of the trendy names of the time getting a look in. There’s Sigha, Pangaea, Shackleton, Mount Kimbie, James Blake, and Joy Orbison, including his one big track everyone wouldn’t stop playing back then, Hyph Mngo. Man, looking at that list, it’s like reading a super-hip indie write-up from back then, dropping names and proclaiming this is the future of music, forward-thinking while honouring the past’s influences. Dubstep was moving on from its inner-London roots, ready to take on all urban locales with techno hand-in-hand, Scuba seemingly ready to play the part of lead and general. Then a Skrillex happened overnight and changed everything. Oh well.

Meanwhile, Sub:Stance does a good job of providing various rugged rhythms and deep basslines. Scuba runs the gamut from minimalist dub (Sigha’s Early Morning Lights, Badawi’s Anlan 7) to UK garage nods (Joy Orbison’s two cuts, George Fitzgerald’s Don’t You), and technobass beasts (Surgeon’s Klonk Pt. 4, Untold’s No-One Likes A Smart Arse, Intra:Mental’s Voyeur), with plenty of abstract broken-beats spread throughout (James Blake’s rub of Mount Kimbie’s Maybes, Ramadanman’s Tempest). As with his DJ-Kicks set, the mixes are quick and surgical, tracks seldom lasting longer than three minutes with only their key features utilized. No sense dawdling on repetitive loops and pointless drum programming, right?

Another similarity to that future mix is ending with an unabashed, hands in the air anthem, in this case Joker’s Psychedelic Runway. Given how heads-down and dark Sub:Stance generally is, it’s shocking hearing such garrish synths and cock-rockin’ rave riffs set to a standard dubstep break. Though considering Scuba ended his Boiler Room set with Madonna’s Vogue, I suspect he can’t help but go for the cheeky climax every time. I will always approve of such shenanigans.

AstroPilot - Solar Walk

Altar Records: 2010

Solar Walk was what piqued my curiosity enough to start diving into AstroPilot's discography. Not because I'd heard tracks elsewhere, or it came highly recommended by psy-ambient experts abroad (are there such folk?). Nay, it came down to the same ol' reason that always afflicts my impulse buying habits: there's a cosmic theme afoot, and I'm never sated on that space music stylee. Hell, the alias Mr. Redko chose for his work intrigued me alone, though having tracks appear on Russian space-race tribute compilation Absence Of Gravity and the final Fahrenheit Project from Ultimae were definitely added incentives to dig further. Then when I searched the Amazons for some affordable options on AstroPilot material, I discovered not only did he have an album called Solar Walk (*squee!*), but a follow-up (*-eeeeeee!*), plus a companion LP called Star Walk (*-eeeeeequss!*). Well, there goes that week's allowance.

What distinguishes the Solar Walk series from AstroPilot’s other albums is the heavy focus on ambient and chill music. I’m not sure if ol’ Dmitriy always intended to seperate his dancefloor friendly material and meditation tent efforts, but it’s not such a bad idea in the long run, especially for a chap as prolific as he. Maybe it was just a coincidence he’d end up alternating between the two styles of album material. Less odd is the fun-fact Solar Walk was his kick-off with Altar Records. Hell, for that matter, this was Altar Records’ album kick-off in general, their first non-compilation release featuring outside talent (re: not DJ Zen at the helm). It certainly was style that fit with the fledgling psy-chill print out of Quebec, a deeply ambient outing with ample layers of pad work and... um, not much else, to be honest.

This isn’t to say we’re in for an hour-long excursion of minimalist drone, the tracks on here incredibly dense in timbre. In fact, for ambient, many of these compositions are rather loud and vast, as though AstroPilot intends his music to sound like nothing less than the grand scope of an endless infinity above. I guess ‘heavenly’ is another apt adjective for this music, but that strikes me as a tad sappy for what we do get, though the spiritual connotations are hard to dismiss. Get all in on that chakra healing, yo’!

Eight tracks make up Solar Walk, some rather short (opener Languor, darker Space Ghosts), others ridiculously long (nineteen minutes of Inside The Harmony). Honestly though, track lengths are almost meaningless where this album’s concerned, each composition continuously mixed into the next. Unless you’re completely focused on the nuances of AstroPilot’s pad work or shifts in tone, three tracks could go by without you realizing it. A couple do offer rhythms, including a gradual reveal of prog-psy groove in God’s Channel, but even with these deviations, Solar Walk mostly plays out like one long piece of layered ambient drone, often lacking distinct musical moments along the way. Still, it’s better than your standard laptop noodle wank.

Adham Shaikh - Resonance - Selected Ambient Works

Sonicturtle Records/Black Swan Sounds: 2010/2013

Hearing Adham Shaikh branch out into music with more tempo and groove is all well and good, but it was his ambient productions that got me digging deeper. Still, though he'd mostly left that part of his career in the '90s, it didn't stop him from composing pieces in his spare time or for other projects. Prominent among these were sounds and scores for various, small-budget films and documentaries, mostly dealing with things like spiritualism, activism, and yogaism. And while they didn’t lead to anything officially released on the market, he kept those works on hand should their ever be an opportunity to make use of them. Turns out there was, in the number of recommendations from associates and friends that told ol’ Adham that he needed to make these available to all us common folk out here in the music wilds. Hey, if it worked for Aphex Twin, why not Adham Shaikh? Oh yes you better believe the Selected Ambient Works sub-title was gonna’ get remarked upon. Uh, that’s I got on that.

Anyhow, I can’t deny once again having preconceived notions of what Resonance would be going in. A return to Journey To The Sun, mayhaps, or a fresh take on ambient dub, as so many ethnic fusion types often do. Heck, even something deeply meditative again would be interesting, just to hear if Mr. Shaikh had picked up some new techniques in composing such music.

Instead, we’re dealing with pieces that are very much score orientated, some sounding not all that dissimilar to the piano and drone works of early Brian Eno (Ambient Dream, Warm Hope, Fibonacci Spriral Song, Opaquealyptic), though with a slight worldy twist. Others tread close to the New Age realm with their heavy mystical and spiritual vibe (Voices Of Hope, Om Shanti Shanti), not a surprising development given Mr. Shaikh’s deep involvement in the yoga scene. A few pieces go all in with traditional sounds like woodwinds and string instruments (Mountains Of The World, For The Heart of The World, Dew Daisy), and a few more run for lengthier times (Gayatri Mantra, Satori), suggesting not everything on Resonance was intended for visual accompaniment. Or maybe they were inspired by credits sequences.

That was my initial trouble with Resonance, where I couldn’t disassociate the music from its original intent of score compositions. It was still enjoyable on that level of course, but without seeing the films, I felt something was lacking. Mind you, it didn’t help I was playing these in the background, never quite focusing on the music. Until it came time for the standard ‘in MP3 player, on headphones, walk’ playthrough anyway, which I always do before writing a review (daily commutes help with this). With my attention properly focused then, my goodness did this music ever open up to my ears! Those stunning, captivating ambient textures that wooed me in Journey To The Sun, they were all here, lurking underneath, waiting to seduce an attentive mind. How’s he keep doing this?

Hybrid Leisureland - Scroll Slide

Ultimae Records: 2010

Before getting into this album, what's the deal with Ultimae this year? We're nearly half way through 2015, and there's been scant material from the label - a couple singles from Miktek and Aes Dana, and that's about it. Perhaps they're going through another one of their occasional fallow periods, focusing on internal restructuring or recruiting drives for new artists. Ooh, maybe they're busy getting ready for another round of re-issues. That'd be wicked-awesome if some of their older material gets the physical format treatment again! Get the buzz out there, boys and girls.

Speaking of words that end with “uzz” (wait for it...), let's talk Scroll Slide from Hybrid Leisureland. The ambient project curated by Hidetoshi Koizumi has popped up on this blog once or twice (Connect.Ohm, Ultimae compilations), but this is the first time I'm diving into a proper solo full-length album by the man from Japan. Not that he has a whole heck of a lot to sift through, this only being his second LP out of three, one earlier on hopelessly obscure print Floor Limit, and a third on equally obscure print Double Life Records (Lord Discogs lists Hybrid Leisureland’s Variable as its only release, though has a catalogue number suggesting a few others out there, unknown to even The Lord That Knows All; methinks it’s an outlet for Mr. Koizumi’s studio though). He hasn’t been in much of a hurry to release material for its own sake either, a surprising approach for the sort of ambient produced under the Hybrid Leisureland banner. Laptop noodlers and synth droners churn out hundreds of such albums yearly, some artists releasing at least a dozen LP-length pieces in the same amount of time ol’ Hidetoshi’s put out three.

Perhaps that’s why Scroll Slide was mostly bypassed even with the greater exposure Ultimae offered. Folks enjoying ambient techno and psy-chill the label’s known for weren’t sure what to make of a pure ambient album of the sort Harold Budd and Brian Eno might have made way back in the day (or in the here and now for that matter). Every delicate touch of piano, soft layer of pad, or minute strike of percussion is treated with an impossibly sense of fragility, as though Hybrid Leisureland’s music was a piece of abstract art made of feathers. You figure it could fall over with the slightest breeze, yet it remains sturdy and sound, defiant against your expectations of physics. Um, I’m not sure how this metaphor translates to the music on Scroll Slide, but you can bet you’d hear these compositions on the speakers of such a gallery in Tokyo.

Each track Mr. Koizumi crafted holds up as individual pieces of music, not just mindless synth drone. Beyond that, however, there honestly isn’t much to detail, though with reasonable runtimes they never noodle about as so much similar ambient does. Think of Scroll Slide as a comforter blanket, leaving you feeling snug and warm within its fuzz.

Various - Renaissance: The Masters Series Part 15 - James Zabiela

Renaissance: 2010

Maybe I should just go back to the beginning, those early seminal mixes that elevated James Zabiela into the progressive elite. Yet would I be let down by those too? There’s so much hype for Utilities, Sound In Motion and ALiVE, their legacy as essential contributions to progressive house/breaks/tech, I fear they can’t help but not live up to their praise. Were they just good for the time, or had ol’ Zabs’ earned enough good will with live shows and Sasha nods that they forgave whatever faults those CDs might have. They certainly can’t have that same sense of missed opportunities as his contributions to Renaissance’s Master Series have.

Let me repeat his CD1 mix from Part 12 remains a great collection of tunes, arranged with wonderful narrative flow; however, the whole package is undone by the hopelessly dated, drab techno of CD2. Part 15 is another double-disc set that would have benefitted from reducing it to one. In this case though, we’re dealing with two half-good mixes rather than one ace and one bunk.

Make no mistake, I was looking forward to hearing this one based on the tracklist alone. So many artists I enjoy, plus others I deeply respect despite not indulging their material as often. Like who, asks you, before knowing the imminent namedrop shall commence. There’s Gui Boratto, Robert Babicz, Guy J, Hardfloor, Spooky, Josh Wink, Kaito, Jori Hulkkanen, Siriusmo, Ellen Allien, Boys Noize, ASC, plus a chap by the name of Peter Benisch I’ve gushed all too often about. Part of what intrigued me about Part 15 was how Zabiela would arrange all these artists into a cohesive DJ set, and the answer is he barely does at all, mostly opting for the mixtape treatment of tracks instead. Okay, cool, I’m sure Zabiela’s got some great selections to showcase throughout the course of these runtimes. Ehh…

CD1, subtitled A Life Less Ordinary, suffers most from this, never gaining any traction until well over the half-way mark with a comfortable groove. Before that though, we run through dubby downbeat (Nosaj Thing’s Fog), clicky chill (Zabiela’s Burnt Bridges), shoegazey electro (R3volve’s Bootpacker Alpha), microfunk (ASC’s Porcelain), and acid-ragga breaks (Ruxpin’s A Sunrise). All cool music, but little connection between any of it beyond tunes Zabiela’s fond of, and the distracting, injected dialog snippets don’t help matter either (shame, because such recordings were also a plus in Part 12’s favor). Still, a strong finish for this disc, even if it’s thanks to Benisch’s Skymning pulling it forward (no bias!).

CD2, subtitled Afterlife, almost has a good start with some melodic Detroit techno (Vince Watson’s Long Way From Home, but is followed upon deep tech-house that has all the substance of a rice cracker. At least it isn’t plodding, and once Zabiela gets out of the fussy bloopiness of it all, he settles into an enjoyable proggy outing with a little acid funk thrown in. There, that wasn’t so hard. Why you no do that from the start?

Various - Ether

Altar Records: 2010

The fifth element is ether? Was this officially sanctioned by the Ancient Old-Timey Classical Hold-Outs Consortium? I mean, it's definitely a better option than 'love' or 'heart', but what's ether supposed to represent? Spirit and soul? Immaterial ghosts and energy beings? Neutrinos and positrons? Whatever the Hell cosmic foam is supposed to be? Maybe it’s that pseudo fourth state matter can exist as, plasma. However you logically justify ether being an element, in the case of Altar Records’ Elements series, it’s just an excuse to worm in a fifth CD as a cap to the enterprise. And thank God’s ether blood they did, because this just might be the best of them all.

Without spoiling the other two editions much (Fire and Water, obviously), this compilation series does maintain a solid streak throughout. There's exotic instrumentation, trancey synths and pads, psychedelic sound effects that owe plenty to Shpongle's influence, moments of proggy groove (or nearly a full run-through, in one CD’s case), and more than enough ethnic dub that even Megadog should feel weak in the knees. Nothing ever sounds cheap or forced, seldom ever pointlessly overproduced, and flits between enough variations of the style to keep each CD engaging from front to back. However, this is all still quite standard stuff as psy-chill goes, which isn't that surprising as Altar head DJ Zen and his gathered roster grew within the scene itself. It does make a difference coming in from different music backgrounds though, as the Mighty Ultimae attests to.

Ether does right in shaking free of those tropes, though obviously not completely. Altar simply wasn’t established enough to go plucking artists from dub techno labels and the like, nor do I get the sense DJ Zen’s too interested in doing so. Still, what we do get here though gets me all atwitter.

First, the psy dub to open. Yeah, nothing terribly new there even for a 2010 release, but Mr. Peculiar’s Ancient Tribes has some gnarly world beat vibes going for it. Then AstroPilot show up with Answers, and it’s an utterly lush, ethereal piece of Balearic bliss. Shortly following that is Distant System with an exclusive track, Astral Map Error. *squeeee* You already know I’ll praise this kick-ass slice of spacey prog psy, but I dare say this standalone is better than nearly every cut off Spiral Empire.

The sci-fi nature of Distant System isn’t a one-shot on Ether either (read it out loud, you know you want to!). Tentura’s Free Your Mind and E-Mantra’s Emptiness skew in this direction as well, adding an extra dimension to the Elements series after being so generally grounded (though Air did have its floating moments too). In case space doesn’t project your consciousness high enough though, Ether closes out with Asura’s epic Everlasting. That track’s appeared in a couple places now, including last year’s Radio Universe, but it was on this CD first, and a perfect conclusion to a fine series of compilations. Upper astral waits.

Various - Earth

Altar Records: 2010

Now this is a different approach. Most artwork depicting the Earth elemental tends to favor things dealing with rock, soil, and whatever images we associate with terra firma, the solid ground beneath our feet (or the fiery furnace further below, if you’ve read the Death Gate Cycle) . Thus, many of the colors that come with the dirt we dig into are tied to the element too - brown, burgundy, and such are often described as ‘earth tones’. Yet such colors are not exclusive to Earth, the planet, similar shades often found on other celestial bodies in various states. On the other hand, a color does exist that has thus far been found exclusively of Earth, a pigment that’s a by-product of photosynthesis within plant life: green. How cool is it that, instead of rehashing the same ol’ symbolism associated with the classical Earth elemental, they incorporated something scientifically unique to planet Earth instead. It, like, makes you think cosmic big, and all that, yo’.

Less unique is the style of psy-chill found on Earth itself, with influences from world beat and dub finding their way in. Makes sense as those are mostly ‘earthly’ forms of music, especially whenever things go more groovy and tribal – no sense rocking the ‘element theme compilation’ foundations too much. Earth was also the fourth in the Altar’s Elements series, released a mere year after Air had kicked things off, and some strain with the concept was already showing, label boss and compiler DJ Zen recycling many names despite everyone still offering up exclusive tracks. That’s fine if it’s point of these roster showcases, but the way it’s gone about with Earth is odd.

For instance, Zymosis shows up thrice (note: mistake from my Air review, AstroPilot (Dmitriy Redko) is not a member of Zymosis, but rather Dmitriy Lihachov; got my Dmitriys mixed up) with the following credits: CJ Catalizer vs Zymosis, Tentura vs Zymosis, and Zymosis vs Tentura. What on earth (Earth!) is the point of crediting tracks like the latter two? Trying to give as equal billing to the collaborators as possible? Why not just create a ‘supergroup’ alias then? It’s not like the tunes are that dissimilar anyway.

Other names on this compilation include Asura (Charles Farwell had basically set up a second home with Altar by this point), Chronos (don’t worry, I’ll get to him soon), Lab’s Cloud (who’s released two albums with Altar now), plus veteran acts like Vibrasphere, Ra, and Chi-A.D. rounding things out (literally, as two of them bookmark the CD). A solid enough list of acts, all said, but very little on Earth leaps out beyond what fans of the genre are familiar with. Only Ra’s March Of The Lunar Priests, a spacey goa thing with a rhythm that does sound like a march, leaped above the highly competent productions I’m already spoiled by from this label. That’s always the problem with these genre compilation splurges though, isn’t it? What’s stunning in isolation turns average in bunches.

Setrise & Kay Wilder - Poetry Clash (2014 Update)

SPX Digital: 2010

(Click here to read my original TranceCritic review)

Oh come on! I know I said in my last 20xx Update that I should treat these posts as an opportunity to improve upon my past writing. That, now with a concise format and dedicated self-restriction, one can read better reviews that don't endlessly ramble on. What I hadn't counted on was dealing with this one as an early attempt. Well, okay, I did know, in that my short queue doesn't change that much, but you aren't all seriously expecting me to write Poetry Clash over? I barely got over four-hundred words on the original, and ain't no way I can manage it again, even with wasting a good hundred with my current griping. The original was written when I was already finding success with brevity anyway, so there's no point in me redoing it. Besides, does anyone care about the exploits of Setrise and Kay Wilder four years on? Yeah, I thought not.

That all ranted, I was curious to see what SPX Digital had been up to. They got their ball rolling towards the tail-end of TranceCritic's run, which had me feeling a little guilty over the promos they kept sending without any response. Not that the website had much impact in the trance scene overall, but for any start-up web label, some exposure is always better than no exposure, even if that exposure sometimes came at the end of a snarky quip. SPX though, I liked a couple of their early singles enough that, should I have found myself in need of looking at their Discogian database again, a small tingle of anticipation would tickle up my neck. Did they last longer than a year? Sign any singles from prominent acts? Premiered any up and comers that are stars today? Branch out into bigger and better things like albums, DJ mixes, and *gasp* CDs?

Nay to all that. Well, unless you consider names like Bryn Whiting and Mysterious Movement unheralded producers of trance. It also appears that SPX’s output sputtered out by the end of 2013, but to make sure it wasn’t a case of folks failing to keep Lord Discogs’ records current, I checked out the SPX Digital website. It no longer exists. Ah well, thirty singles isn’t so bad for a trance label, even a digital one.

As for Setrise and Kay Wilder, neither produced much else of note, though Setrise did last a couple years longer. The Steve Birch Remix of Poetry Clash also got picked up by Christopher Lawrence for one of his DJ mix compilations (Rush Hour), which isn’t too surprising as ol’ C.L. had been a supporter of the ‘real underground trance’ movement Johns Askew and Fleming promoted. Listening back on this single, it remains the best of the lot, as close to the tough, energetic tech-trance as you were likely to hear in those days and beyond. Wait, maybe I’m thinking of the Rob van den Beuken Remix. Gads, this EP’s flittered away from me brainpan. Such is so.

Gorillaz - Plastic Beach (Proper Review)

Parlaphone: 2010

Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett, you brilliant bastards. First you create a charming ‘anti-pop’ pop cartoon band, then you give them ongoing history and continuity. Following that, you withhold working on said project for only those times you’re bothered to engage with it, turning each Gorillaz release into an event. I quipped in the kayfabe review the cartoon character’s antics were eclipsing their music, but reality isn’t that far off either. The release of Plastic Beach saw a ridiculous amount of multi-media promotion, fully embracing all the broadcasting power of our Web 2.0 society, including any extraneous detritus that comes with it (no, I don’t want the super-deluxe internet-enhanced version of this album, thank you, CD sticker).

Albarn's inspiration for this Gorillaz session came from an unusual place compared to previous albums. Instead of making a musical statement against the corporate machine, the rubbish buried in the sand near his beach house gave him pause with the current state of our planet. What a perfect time to ascend the soapbox then, especially under the guise of a beloved collection of world-class misfits. Hewlett, for his part, wasn't so convinced, feeling particularly finished with the whole Gorillaz concept. Still, with the opportunity to further morph his cartoon creations to reflect a growing sense of global crisis, he rose to the challenge. Murdoc turned further demonic; 2D became traumatized by the events, his distinct black eye sockets now pale white; Russell grew ginormous, a side-effect of swimming all the way to Plastic Beach while consuming all the nasty pollution in the waters between; Noodle was incognito, but don't worry, here's a cyborg replacement. Wee, such fun things we do to these fictional characters!

The result is one of the most conceptually cohesive LPs under the Gorillaz banner, with bittersweet funk and soul melded with tinny Casio electro-hop and quirky Brit-pop throughout. While some could argue such stylistic markers as a bit of a bandwagon jump on Albarn’s part (Owl City was omnipresent), it fits the tone Albarn was shooting for, a mishy-mash of plastic sounds, as though cobbled together from all manner of musical debris gathered at Point Nemo. Plenty of rappers once again join in for guest spots, including Snoop Dogg, Kano & Bashy, Mos Def, plus a returning De La Soul. Unfortunately, none of their verses match the highs found on older Gorillaz hits (you know the ones). Yet, I suspect that was intentional too, Plastic Beach not as interested in aiming for peak chart impact as before, even with a few earwormy bits like Stylo’s breezy electro-funk and On Melancholy Hill’s dreamy lullaby sweetness thrown in.

The caveat with Plastic Beach is it lacks the guiding hand of an establish hip-hop producer (Dangermouse, Dan The Automator), Albarn handling most of those duties himself this time out. He’s definitely learned a lot, showing skill in the style his taken on here. If you enjoyed older Gorillaz for the gritty hip-hop and fearless funk-fusion, however, it’s sorely lacking here.

Gorillaz - Plastic Beach (Kayfabe Review)

Parlaphone: 2010

The remarkable thing about Plastic Beach was that it got made at all. Murdoc Niccals must have burned so many bridges (not to mention countless buildings and studios) throughout his career, it’s any wonder he can find willing participants and collaborators for his music projects. Hell, rumors abound that 2D initially wasn't a willing participant, though Murdoc denies any allegations of kidnapping on his part. Mind, as with anything Mr. Niccals claims, take it with a twenty pound lump of salt, but one cannot deny 2D sounded about as fine in singing form throughout Plastic Beach as he ever has. Maybe he just needs Murdoc's, um, 'encouragement', every so often. Might explain the inspiration for that that secret solo album he recorded while the band was touring this one.

Or perhaps ol’ Murdoc had finally saw the excesses of his life consuming him, and he promised to turn over a new leaf if all his music friends came with him to Point Nemo in making this album. Either that, or he was in need of an army to defend him from those Boogiemen after him. Let this be a lesson to all you budding musicians out there: don’t make deals with the devil for your fame, or you’ll suffer from incessant collectors, and no amount of awesome bass shredding skills is worth that.

Okay, off my perch there. Point is, Murdoc must have gotten incredibly reflective of his life to have written an album like this one. Plastic Beach was never going to be Demon Days, for no better fact than Noodle couldn’t contribute to this album (and sorry, Mr. Niccals, the cyborg could never replace her). A shame, since a few upbeat tunes like Dirty Harry and Dare might have elevated Plastic Beach to unprecedented heights of awesome. Ah well, she had other issues to deal with at the time. Now that the band’s all back together though (where ever they’re currently hiding), maybe they’ll finally find a new studio, and we can hear a proper full-on Gorillaz collaborative project!

Plastic Beach though, man is it ever a mellow album. It boggles my mind that Murdoc wrote the entirety of it – seriously, are there ghostwriters here? That guy from Blur, for instance, who headlined the second unit Gorillaz tour group, he looks suspicious. Or maybe Murdoc is just a bigger softy than he ever lets on, a gumdrop sugar candy wrapped in icky green skin complexion. Guess that would explain why all these rappers and musicians came when he called upon them, though it would have been nice if he’d waited for Russel to show up too. Right, Murdoc felt the Casio drums fit the Plastic Beach theme, but I’m missing that tasty, bassy hip-hop funk from way back in the day. Changing tides, I guess.

Plastic Beach is fine for what it is, though unfortunately the events surrounding the band tended to overshadow the music within. So it goes with Gorillaz these days, doesn’t it?

Antendex - Photons

Force Intel: 2010

I kicked this November’s batch of reviews off with ZerO One, an ambient techno producer that isn’t all that dissimilar to The Higher Intelligence Agency. Now I’m at the end of November reviewing an album called Photons from Antendex, another collection of music that bears striking similarities to The HIA. And in the middle of this month I reviewed Boards Of Canada’s Geogaddi, which only has tangentially related stylistic markers within ambient techno’s scope to any of these acts. But a tangent is a prominent feature in geometry and trigonometric applications, which is more math you know – just know - BoC intended as another hidden clue to that album’s deeper meanings that the music alone couldn’t articulate. And that message…? That I’m never gonna’ let fan-based theoretical bollocks go, am I?

Seriously though, it’s a remarkable coincidence that this month of reviews is bookmarked by a pair of such albums. However, where ZerO One’s efforts were of a more playful approach, Antendex (or Tamás Olejnik to Hungarian credit companies) goes for the serious, experimental side of ambient ‘bleep’ dub techno. Though I immediately thought of HIA when listening to Photons, you could probably namedrop plenty other early IDM acts who shared similar aesthetics with Bobby Bird’s work (Autechre, Biosphere, etc.). This album also smacked some sense into my jaded assumptions of ambient techno’s non-status in the new millennium. I had no idea anyone would make deliberately old-school ‘bleep’ dub, yet on reflection it shouldn’t have surprised me, dub techno finding all sorts of in-roads with budding laptop producers. That Mr. Olejnik would craft an album strong enough to gain Force Intel’s notice and blessing is remarkable, but then perhaps the Mille Plateaux offshoot had as much of a hankering for the retro style Antendex offered as I did.

Yeah, I should get this out of the way: as a collection of ‘bleep’ ambient dub,Photons is incredibly vintage, almost to a fault. I don’t know whether Mr. Olejnik was directly inspired by Bird, but these sound an awful lot like HIA b-sides. If I’ve never convinced you of the wicked-neat sounds of HIA, I doubt I’ll have any luck with Antendex. If you’re game though, stick around to the end of this review for some convincing. Or pie. I promise there’ll be pie afterwards.

Photons is made up of thirteen primary tracks, plus a remix of the first song Quanta. Other track titles include names like Emission, Amino, Modulation, and Dronflex. This is all very geeky sounding, and the music is too. It’s also quite pretty in that minimalist way spacious bleep ambience can go, though a few experimental drone tracks are littered about too. Very little breaches the four minute mark either, giving these tracks an bit of pop writing sensibility. Just as well since the sonic ideas Antendex brings up in each track didn’t need much exploration anyway. It’s all rather samey throughout, but if it’s a sound you can dig, your ear-holes shall be tickled proper.

Psycoholic - Parallel Universe

Psy Spy Records: 2010

Why is it that every time I kick off a new letter now, it’s with something ridiculously obscure? ‘O’ had Wyatt Keusch’s Object-Relations, ‘N’ featured Dub Trees’ Nature Never Did Betray The Heart That Loved Her; ‘M’ was a little better with Macro Dub Infection, Volume 1 (can anything released by Virgin be rare?), but who’d have ever heard of Cheb I Sabbah’s La Kahena? You’d have to go all the way back to the ‘I’s for something everyone should have heard about (it’s an Aphex Twin album).

However, let me turn your attention back to the album that began my run through ‘G’, Aquila’s Gain Control. It was a free full-on psy trance album downloaded from Ektoplazm, and not a terribly remarkable one at that. I only bring it up because, coincidentally, our journey through ‘P’ begins with another free full-on psy trance album that I downloaded from Ektoplazm, Psycoholic’s Parallel Universe. And… if you look at some alphabet charts, ‘G’ is above ‘P’. Additionally, if you were to replace the letters by their sequenced number, ‘G’ is ‘7’, ‘P’ is ‘16’, which can be divided by ‘2’, giving us ‘8’. ‘8’ follows ‘7’, which means ‘G’ precedes half of ‘P’, and Boards Of Canada’s album Geogaddi starts with the letter ‘G’, which means… which means…

Which means I’ve wasted enough word count on this nonsense. Yeah, sorry about that, but sometimes my brain gets caught in feedback loops of silliness, wondering where it might take me once I’ve stepped onto that path. I could go on and on if I didn’t have a psy trance album I should be reviewing instead. So what information can I dig up on this Psycoholic chap… Uh huh, uh huh, is Russian, real name Mikhail Fedosov, released another album prior to this one called (*shudder*) Trance World Over, hasn’t released much since this one, though carries on a psy trance compilation series titled Psytrance Open Air. That’s about all Lord Discogs provides me on this front.

As should be abundantly clear by now, I’ve little to discuss regarding Parallel Universe. It’s certainly a fine collection of full-on psy, Mr. Fedosov’s production beefier than most acts I’ve come across in this genre. He’s also unafraid of getting his melodic trance on, some tracks sounding like psy coverings of classics of that scene, though more subtle about it than Alien Project’s blatant rip-offs were. Sevgilim could have been a proper Dutch anthem, Light Years Ahead has a charming melodic line to go with its ‘buttrock’ goa guitars, Alfaville has to have found inspiration from the Balearic trance branch, Kuzlaring features ethereal vocals (!), and We Will Make You Happy… ooh, I’m getting a bit of that vintage German trance vibe on this one. Minor key melodies and evil dialog samples for the win!

Parallel Universe has just enough cleverness going for it to check it if you need a little more full-on psy in your life, but won’t win you over otherwise.

AstroPilot - Here And Now

Altar Records: 2010

Dmitriy Redko was a busy body in 2010 – or rather, his new home on Altar Records was busy for him, releasing a whopping four LPs under the AstroPilot banner. Man, label head DJ Zen must have thoroughly enjoyed Fruits Of The Imagination to go all-in on whatever else the Siberian psy guy had stored up. Since this has a latter catalogue number following Solar Walk, Shamanium, and Mitra, I’ll assume Here And Now was the current stuff Redko was working on; the title’s a pretty safe hint too.

AstroPilot’s work ethic has earned him a solid reputation within the psy scene, capably flitting various sub-genres like few others. His tracks have found homes on ambient compilations, psy dub collections, progressive trance mixes, and even tech-plonk house showcases. Okay, not that last one, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Redko’s got some stored away, gathering digital dust on a harddrive untl he decides to go house (they all go house, eventually). While I wouldn’t put him quite on par with some of Ultimae’s Solar stars, he’s definitely up in their leagues, and might even have released LPs there if he hadn’t joined Altar. Well, that whole ‘not exclusively a chill-out producer’ part probably didn’t help either. That’s why you make multiple aliases, mang!

Anyhow, let’s focus on the here and now with Here And Now. Mr. Redko’s mostly taking on prog psy’s domain with this album, though he doesn’t limit himself there either, throwing in breaks and even ...glitch-step breakcore? Wha...? Oh, it’s a collaboration with another Russian psy guy named Pharmacore. Whichever style you call it, at least you can play it at both 88 and 176 bpm!

That’s just an outlier though, a bit of experimentation tacked on to album’s end. Like I said, prog psy’s the name of AstroPilot’s game on Here And Now, and he serves up a bevy of choice cuts for the synapses. I mean, geez, Karma Cleaner! What a lush sounding track this is! Solid pumping groove, glowing goa trance licks, evocative ethnic singing coming in from astral planes, and widescreen production that’s utterly bonkers in how expansive it makes this track sound. Prog psy’s not supposed to sound this big. Other tracks likeHiding Wings and Time Tides are equal to Karma Cleaner’s bar, though a bit more straight-forward where this style’s concerned.

Other tunes mix the formula further, with Memories Maze throwing in breaks at the start before unleashing some propulsive psy action; meanwhile Indigo goes for the full-on breakbeat action. And speaking of full-on, there’s bloody ‘buttrock’ guitar thrash in Variants, and when did this album suddenly get all fierce and nasty on us? The ramp in energy was so gradual, I hardly noticed it.

I knew AstroPilot was a good producer, but that was based off his Solar Walk material. I had no idea he could offer just as awesome yang to those albums’ yins. Get on Here And Now if you’ve even the slightest interest in psy music. Trust.

Troum - Mare Idiophonika

Tourette Records: 2010

See, this is the sort of release I expect from the dark ambient scene. Troum are comprised of former members of Maeror Tri, one of the few 'deep underground' industrial bands of the early '90s that could count on being name-dropped as highly influential and all that rot. That they would start doing experimental ambient stuff was inevitable, almost a requirement for any self-respecting industrialist really. The two members of Troum even have quirky cyberpunk names, Glit[S]ch and Baraka[H] (I'm guessing the “h” is silent). Throw in a multitude of LPs released in the past fifteen years, and you've got a dark ambient duo that's built up quite the legacy for themselves, on par with luminaries like Nurse With Wound and Merzbow. Good for them. Shame I didn't stumbled upon a stronger album than this as my first impression of Troum. Maybe a re-recording of a live performance wasn't the best point to dive in with this duo.

It has a great start, mind you, working a methodical, droning build with plenty of tasty dark ambient textures. Funny enough, it even opens with heavily-echoed bass guitar, which gave me pause in thinking I’d accidentally replayed In The Mist’s Lost. But nay, whereas van Cauter’s music retained his sludgy doom metal roots, The Self-Playing Ocean (the only titled composition on Mare Idiophonika) is clearly a product of the industrial scene, a sense of suffocating technology reverberating through your earholes as bleak, dystopian pads create a choking atmosphere of anxiety and dread. As I also mentioned in the Lost review, dark ambient is best when momentum is suggested, that the composers aren’t spinning their sonic wheels under the pretence of ‘minimalism for artistic sake’. Troum work an excellent build here, The Self-Playing Ocean creating a sense of musical pressure that begs for release of some sort.

That Troum would add a rhythm to the track makes sense, as it’s a logical step in maintaining The Self-Playing Ocean’s urgency. I just wish they’d have chosen one less bland than the repetitive tribal loop they settled on. What briefly did add an interesting new element soon turned into a distraction from all the weird, discordant sound drones going on, and lingers in a lo-o-o-ong fade out for well past any point of usefulness (about fifteen minutes worth). Once gone, you realize it didn’t add much of anything to The Self-Playing Ocean, the track working just as fine had the music remained solely on its dronier aspects.

Its retreat also marks an abrupt change for the forty-five minute long piece, settling into orchestral swells and such. Not a bad way to end on, but after the tedious middle portion, I've kind of zoned out on Mare Idiophonika, and not in the good way ambient music does – your mileage may vary. For me, the brief bit of blissy music tacked onto the end of the CD as a secret song was more enjoyable than most of The Self-Playing Ocean. No lame tribal loops!

Ametsub - The Nothings Of The North

Mille Plateaux: 2010

Mille Plateaux’s had many starts and stops since the label first emerged two decades ago, its latest (and seemingly last) perhaps the most disappointing. Glitch music was turning into a commercially viable force, and here was one of the genre’s Godfather labels returning in 2010. Nor was this just a small relaunch offloading and redistributing back-catalog, oh no. They were signing new artists and even setting up sub-labels, perhaps creating a new musical empire within the realms of minimalistic experimentation that would put Mille Plateaux’s former glory years to shame! Or not.

Sadly, the label ceased releasing material in but a year’s worth of operation, and Mille Plateaux’s website still hasn’t been updated since 2010. Maybe it couldn’t compete with all the free laptop ambient-glitch material clogging up the interwebs? Whatever the case, the initial hope the label could grow again was kicked off with this particular album, Ametsub’s The Nothings Of The North.

Ametsub himself is a minor enigma, even with three albums to his name (this one being his second). Japanese in origin, no name is provided on the broken-English bio at his homepage, though he’s toured enough to earn a few associative namedrops in it (Actress, Apparat, Plaid, Floating Points). If Nothings Of The North is anything to go by, it's small wonder Mille Plateaux would have tapped him for their 2010 relaunch, the music here very much in the 'jazz-click' and 'micro-hop' aesthetic you'd associate with impossibly stuffy conceptual experimentation.

Already backing out that door, are you? Can't blame you, the above descriptors appealing only to the most egg-headed musical sorts. Honestly, I felt the same way when I first heard this as a promo, my patience for glitch-click minimalist techno already stretched to its breaking point. Something kept me from deleting it after that initial listen though, a subtle warmth lurking underneath it all. Ametsub's approach reminds me a lot of early Akufen, where ear-wormy patterns emerge with a couple repeated plays. Also, there's none of the dry sterility that marks so much experimental glitch, in fact a strange bit of warmth permeating throughout. Chalk it up to Ametsub's ear for rhythm, things playing mostly on the downbeat that wouldn't be too out of place on Ninja Tune in an alternate universe where Amon Tobin performed at art museums.

The Nothings Of The North is an odd one, but then what would you have expected from a Mille Plateaux album? Not a 'morning after' LP, that's for sure, but this one sure does the trick I've found, 66 encapsulating this perfectly. It starts all sketchy with constrictive field-recordings, like being stuck in a savanna tree as a wildebeest stampede thunders all around you (ooh, such a headache...). All you want is to curl inside, retreating from the harsh elements outside. Yet, you brave the sunlight, and the song erupts in a rapturous, overbearing synth wash, nearly numbing your senses into submission. You come away feeling refreshed, vitalized, the previous paranoia miraculously cleansed away. Or something.

ASC - Nothing Is Certain

Nonplus Records: 2010

ASC’s been around a while, but in the wide world of drum–n-bass, he came across as just another guy in a sea of highly competent producers stuck following tried-and-tested formulae and genre tropes. Ain't a thing wrong with that, but somewhere along the way, James Clements got it inside his head that 'deebee' could be more than what was out there, that there were still musical roads yet explored. Fortunately, he found a pair of producers at a similar crossroad, Alex Green and Damon Kirkham of Instra:mental, and while those two were key in establishing labels that would promote their ideas, ASC turned into one of their most dependable contributors.

Their ‘microfunk’ work on Autonomic with dBridge earned them plenty of critical praise, but that was a short lived phase, more of a cul-de-sac if anything. About the same time, however, Alex Green set up Nonplus Records, and proposed a stunning question for the drum-n-bass scene: must we be held down by genre conventions? In short time, Nonplus offered an outlet for bass music producers to free themselves of their old shackles, purist fanbases be damned.

When ASC dropped Nothing Is Certain for Nonplus, it was as much a statement of the label's manifesto as it was a game-changer within Mr. Clements' discography. Here was a d'n'b guy, releasing an album on a label fronted by d'n'b guys, with barely a hint of d'n'b presented. For sure, the urban vibe of London bass music is still felt throughout the LP, but instead of reflecting on the clime's contemporary scenery, Nothing Is Certain looks to a possible future for the city. It's Detroit techno futurism for England, one of the few times this concept ever manifested itself within the d'n'b scene.

Yeah, future dystopia’s been a common theme in plenty of jungle, not to mention sci-fi inspired music too – heck, ASC alone released several mini-EPs titled Sci-Files before this one. The music here, however, keeps things grounded in metropolis landscapes, with little sinister about the environment as we casually cruise through neo-London streets late at night, sprawling skyscrapers towering over scattered novelty chip fryers. Classic electro is definitely a major competent here, tracks like Losing You, The Ubiquity Incident, and Matter Of Time begging for an icy-cool anime as visual accompaniment.

Of course, this isn’t the first time the UK’s dabbled down these sonic avenues, the early days of ambient techno, dub and IDM cropping up in ASC’s work here - Absent Mind has the bleepy hallmarks of Higher Intelligence Agency, while Yatta indulges in Autechre glitch-melancholy. For the most part though, such musical lineage is but a backbone, tracks like Lost For Words, The Depths, and Opus working within the world of post-dubstep and atmospheric jungle. In the process, Nothing Is Certain sounds remarkably unique, stylistic music that Clements has made his own. If you’ve resisted the hype behind ASC’s last half-decade of material, this album will convince you its deserved full stop.