AuroraX - Evolutionary Voyage

Altar Records: 2015

Thank God, Vishnu, Clupxtergh, and sanity that Lord Discogs isn't the only source of data on some artists. If that were the case, I'd be hooped on the bare-bones entry for AuroraX, his lone entry being this new album on Altar Records. Maybe he has contributed tracks to a digital compilation or four, but unless such labels have dedicated chroniclers submitting releases to the Lord That Knows All, Discogs couldn't give much of a care. This is especially troubling for musicians who've been making their name with Soundcloud, a streaming format that goes unrecognized by Discogs as anything official. And for good reason too, as any ol' chap or chappette could upload something and claim it worthy of the Lord's attention. We need some barriers to His Domain, some standards and practices implemented. Hard copies, yes. Soft copies, maybe. Edible copies, definitely not.

AuroraX has been building his base through Soundcloud, but I don’t bother with that site anymore, so I’m out of the loop there. Lord Discogs provided a Facebook link through an ‘alias’, Desislav Georgiev, but it’s all in Eastern bloc typeface so not much help there either. Fortunately, the Bandcamp page for Evolutionary Voyage has proven somewhat helpful. AuroraX hails from Bulgaria, and his real name is (surprise) Desislav Georgiev. The rest of the blurb goes into some hilariously over-the-top descriptions for his music, capping off with “AuroraX brings a fresh perspective to the meaning of universal consciousness.” Ugh, that’s a bit much for my bullshit detector to take, but I must have bought what the PR was selling, because I’ve obviously bought the CD as well.

I honestly didn’t know what I was getting with Evolutionary Voyage. Some idea, sure; this is Altar Records we’re dealing with, and they’ve cultivated quite the catalogue of psy-leaning music. Whether this album was prog-psy or psy-chill or space ambient though, I hadn’t a clue. I kinda’ figured something like AstroPilot, and I was right. In fact, I was correct about any other guess I could have made too, because for plus and minus, this sounds very much like an Altar Records album.

AuroraX is a fine producer, of that there’s no doubt, and quite mesmerizing in his compositions with tracks evolving and morphing as they play out. Sometimes they do the slow prog thing (Anima’s Dream, Navigations, Inner), other tracks will gradually build into a brisk pace (Project Voyager, Spatial Contemplation, Stars And Rising Tides), and the remaining two opt for pure psy-chill space bliss (Tales Of The Particles, Lifetime Satellite). Yeah, only eight tracks on here, but there’s plenty going on in them to get your Altar staples fix. I just wish I could recommend this as something more than that.

My only criticism is I didn’t hear a clear style I’d identify as AuroraX’ own, Evolutionary Voyage coming off like an amalgamation of other artists on this label. Maybe he just needs some more development, but if not, it’s not so bad being the Altar Voltron.

King Midas Sound, Fennesz - Edition 1

Ninja Tune: 2015

It took The Bug several years to release new music after his critical smash, London Zoo, but the man behind The Bug, Kevin Martin, did keep busy with other projects. Feeling the itch for something with a little more soul, he hooked up with downtempo jazz crooner Roger Robinson to form King Midas Sound. The resulting album, Waiting For You..., provided a fresh spin on urban soul, mixing The Bug’s grit with a traditionally smooth style of music. Throw in a few additional vocals from dubstep vocalist Kiki Hitomi, and you’ve got something akin to a Massive Attack record for the grime generation. Then the project went on hiatus, Mr. Martin’s time consumed by touring, not to mention the pressure of doing that eventual London Zoo follow-up.

Well, that’s all done and dusted now, so ol’ Kevin got to reconvene with Mr. Robinson for another kick at the King Midas can. Instead of simply retreading their first album though, they wanted to push their concept of dub ‘n’ soul as far as they could, to creatively challenge themselves as well as the expectations of their audiences. Thus, the Editions series, where the duo invites a like-minded producer into the studio for a session and sees what come may. Mr. Martin states he has four such albums planned, but kicking this off is guitar fuzz and experimental glitch producer Christian Fennesz. You might remember him such albums like Hotel Paral.lel, Music For An Isolation Tank, AUN – The Beginning And The End Of All Things, plus forty seven degrees 56' 37" minus sixteen degrees 51' 08", and Venice. Yeah, he’s the sort that would have been comfy on Mille Plateaux, if he wasn’t already releasing much of his music on the ‘arty’ label, Touch.

Right from the outset of Edition 1, the Fennesz influence is apparent. Throughout opener Mysteries, droning pulses melt into static dub while Robinson’s vocals float through the fuzz as calm strings glide throughout. Second cut On My Mind finds a beat and Kiki on the vocals, which brings it a little closer to the first Kind Midas Sound album, but there’s still ample ambient static fuzz making it distinct to Fennesz’ style. Third composition Waves goes for a bleak bit of beatless music, moody soul oozing from the edges before morphing into a lengthy stretch of pure wide-screen ambient. Loving Or Leaving is the closest we get to something for the grime heads (trap hi-hats!), and even that’s impossibly cavernous in its dub.

Really, droning ambient dominates much of Edition 1, some tracks like closer Our Love and thirteen-plus minute Above Water forgoing vocals altogether. Even the few remaining tracks that utilize Roger and Kiki treat their words as just another instrument of sonic layering. It makes that second Instrumental CD seem redundant at first glance, though the absence of vocals is apparent in the tracks that did still center on them. Who’d have thought they’re crucial components on an album of thick ambient and soulful dub.

Dr. Octagon - Dr. Octagonecologyst

DreamWorks Records: 1996

The Golden Age Of Hip-Hop was over, and one of the premier groups to usher in that era, Ultramagnetic MC’s, were heading their separate ways. Kool Keith, whom you most definitely know from The Prodigy’s Fat OF The Land, was the likeliest of the group to have a successful solo career, and he’s done that in spades, clubs, and diamond-encrusted hearts. He’s released album after album after album, running through numerous aliases in doing so, and has earned him the reputation of one of the hardest working MC’s of the last two decades. This, despite some serious issues of quality control, especially with a preponderance of crude sex raps that’d make even Luke of 2 Live Crew ask what the cheese. It all had to start somewhere though, and that was with his most critically hailed alias, Dr. Octagon.

While hip-hop’s flush with quirky personas, this one has to rank up there with the most bizarre. See, he’s not some clichéd ‘doctor of lyricism’ or the like; rather, Dr. Octagon is half mad scientist, half time traveling extra-terrestrial (he comes from the planet Jupiter), and half kink scene gynecologist. This provides Keith a setting where horrorcore, nerdcore, and porno raps all cross paths, with an emphasis on tongue-twisting vocabulary that’s equal parts humorous and perverse. When he says he’s gonna’ dissect rectums, treat your chimpanzee acne and moosebumps, and prescribe a treatment of Pepsi cola, Pepto Bismal, bugs, and pop rocks, you can’t be sure if he’s utterly insane, or has fun screwing about the operating room (between sessions of screwing patients in the operating room). Elsewhere, his assistant Uncle Gerbik is a half shark half alligator half man, and over two centuries old. Clearly Dr. Octagonecologyst is an album firmly planted in cheek, probably sewed there with satin threads and rubber needles.

So Kool Keith had something unique going for him here, but what gave Dr. Octagon a quick cult following was the production of Dan The Automator and turntable scratching of DJ Q-Bert (just coming off a string of DMC Championship victories with Mixmaster Mike). Yep, Dr. Octagonecologyst is basically a proto Deltron 3030. Hell, the first track is titled 3000, and sounds like it uses the bleeps from Pierre Henry’s Psyché Rock as a scratch sample among the super-spliffed vibes. Many of the beats are stripped back to a trip-hop haze with old timey French pop loops, serving the macabre tone with a dose of brevity throughout. Man, no wonder Mo Wax wanted in on this.

For all the critical adoration Dr. Octagon generated though, Kook Keith wasn’t the biggest fan of the project, practically ending it right after. He’s actually ‘killed’ the alias multiple times with another persona, Dr. Dooom, and efforts to revitalize him have failed to manifest much of note. Perhaps it’s as it should be, a one-off project that generated underground buzz, but retaining street cred by never overstaying its welcome. Dr. Octagon has operated on all the nether regions he ever will.

Derek Carr - The Digital Space Race

Psychonavigation Records: 2008

Derek Carr isn't super-obscure like some of these Psychonavigation folks are. He has some half-dozen records to his name in the early ‘00s, though mostly jumped from label to label in doing so. By the time he found a semi-permanent home with the Ireland print, he’d already released two albums on another Ireland print, Nice & Nasty Records. And his self-released debut single, Copperbeech EP, is apparently something of a rare collectible for ‘Irish techno by way of Detroit’ enthusiasts, because this is also apparently a scene. That actually has me wondering if Derek Carr is actually his real name. I mean, I can only assume it is so, but Lord Discogs doesn’t have any bio on the guy, and anyone also making Detroit techno with a name like that can’t be a coincidence. Okay, it can, but c’mon, really? Are folks with that combination of syllables just destined to make music of a similar sound? The Techno Gods are weird.

In case it hasn’t become obvious by now, Derek Carr makes minimal gabber; and by ‘minimal gabber’, I of course mean Detroit techno. Its more ‘space age’ than the genre typically goes, The Digital Space Race at times coming off like early Apollo material. Openers Horizons and Butterfly could have found an easy home on those seminal ambient techno compilations, while Letters and Grassy Plains fears no pianos being coupled with their soft electro breaks. Elsewhere, the future funk is present and correct with tracks like 678, Departed Emotion, and Home, while Mr. Carr indulges with a little spritely indulgences with Juvenile and Sis. Plus, can’t neglect the strict ambient cuts, the short Dilated Beyond Belief (hilarious title!) serving as an intermission of sorts, and Surrounded By Nature taking us out in good ol’ space drone fashion.

Um, that’s The Digital Space Race all summed up then, isn’t it. If you’ve ever heard retro Detroit techno, you’ve heard this album, and Mr. Carr isn’t in any sort of hurry to shake the foundations. The tunes are all nice and arranged well enough, but they don’t leap out in any significant way either. Not even the strictly old school production is much of a unique selling point. Novel perhaps, especially for a 2008 release, but this is Derek Carr’s preferred style of music making, and far from the only chap around doing it. Yet I’m hesitant to call The Digital Space Race something silly like ‘recycled’, ‘rote’, or ‘retro to a fault’, because it most definitely is not that either. It may sound sprung from suburban Detroit in the year 1994, but futurism will never age.

As for Carr, he’s put out a couple more albums on Psychonavigation since this one, but more interestingly recently released another single on Trident. This was the ‘print’ he set up to self-release his first single, which I guess he dusted off to put out another EP through Bandcamp. Now wouldn’t that be something, seeing a re-issue of the old Copperbeach EP too.

Various - Digiseeds: Compiled By Ambientium

Ultimae Records: 2015

It took nearly the entirety of 2015, but Ultimae finally released some new music. Okay, they had a single or two earlier in the year, even taking their first bold steps into the vinyl market, but it wasn't until the autumn months we saw anything for us foolish CD collectors. Not that I blame the label for a downturn, taking their time in digitally re-issuing older material for an ever increasing streaming market. Ah well, at least I still had Altar tiding me over.

Ultimae also appears to have spent this fallow year scoping their 'panoramic music' scene for new blood, inviting wandering ambient and chill talents into their fold. Ambientium, or Lubomir Cvrk to the Czech Republic Bureau Of Ambienting, hasn’t released much in his half-decade of music making, but has garnered a respectable cult following in that time. Mostly self-releasing his own material, he’s had a smattering of tracks appear on compilations from Kahvi Collective and Mindsrping Music in recent years, which was apparently enough for Ultimae to come knocking. That, and a few folks were making comparisons between the two as far back as Ambientium’s first album, Fractal Philosophy. Taking a quick listen to it, and oh... oh my! I’m getting some serious Distant System vibes off that album. Hard copy now, please!

Digiseeds, on the other hand, sounds nothing like Distant System (or Androcell, or any other Tyler Smith project). Rather, it’s a new concept compilation series from Ultimae, with Ambientium handling the helm in its first outing. Not sure if it’s Mr. Cvrk’s own series to do with as he pleases, or if it will feature a rotating guest of compilers; heck, I don’t even know if there will be a follow-up, as Ultimae’s had some difficulty in getting any new series going since Fahrenheit Project ended. Hoping for the latter though, especially if they turn out as good as this CD has.

Yeah, yeah, me saying an Ultimae release is good is like calling water wet. I can’t help it that they keep releasing mint material. Ambientium has gathered a remarkable collection of calming music here, where tones, textures, and timbre float through wide open sonic spaces. Its mood music for the mind and soul, best enjoyed on gray morning afters for a little uplifting of the spirit (probably). There’s familiar names in Lars Leonhard and Martin Nonstatic (trust me, he’ll be familiar soon enough) to utter unknowns like Mandrax and Synapsia (lone Lord Discogs entries!). There’s space ambient with One Arc Degree’s Seven Years Of Summer and Ambientium’s Heartbeat, to dubbier glitch with Ocoeur’s Outside and Cloower Wooma’s Human Disease. Mandrax’s Melting has a twee toybox piano melody that has me thinking it’d make for a nice life insurance commercial, and State Azure’s Vertigo has a little old-school sequencers going for it with the dubbed-out textures.

And thus another solid collection from Ultimae. Almost worth the whole year to hear some. Not so long until the next though, eh?

Eat Static - Dead Planet

Mesmobeat: 2015

I was wondering if Eat Static would ever release another album, then ol' Merv goes and gives us a double-album. No wonder he took so long then, and a good idea too. His last foray into the LP domain saw two CDs released as well, though on separate labels focusing on completely different styles. It was a neat idea to feature an exclusively downtempo album for Interchill, but it’d probably be a hard-sell twice. Folks come to Eat Static for the tear-out psy with the crazy cybernetic leads and pulpy sci-fi samples; the few mellow moments under the stoner sun are best served as respites.

Well nothing doing for Dead Planet, once again splitting the Eat Static stylee up between two discs, uptempo stuff on the titular CD, and a chill offering in the second tray titled Human Upgrade. Interestingly, this has been released on Mesmobeat, the label Eat Static set-up for themselves after Planet Dog died, and been in semi-limbo for the past half-decade. What, did no one else want to give this double-LP a chance?

Dead Planet kicks off with another System 7 pairing, tickling all those old-school goa trance triggers in my head. It pretty much goes for the twisted full-on stuff from there though (with one obligatory mint d’n’b leaning cut with Ringlefinch), tracks evolving in dark-psy fashion before unleashing a spacey bit for the climax. It’s all well-produced, but as with so much modern psy-trance, hasn’t evolved much in the past decade, and the same is true for Eat Static’s take on the sound, sci-fi quirks aside. And yet, it’s better than Merv’s dip into other music here. Dragon’s Breath is a frightfully dull tech-plodder, while In All Worlds with Robert Smith is a fine track on a cyberpunk soundtrack, but way out of place here. And Odious Odium sounds like it’s building up to a hideously obnoxious brostep drop (clap builds! glitch-bends!), then does an awesome one-eighty into spaced-out tear-out psy (that low-end!). That’s the Eat Static I love!

Human Upgrade meanwhile... holy cow, where did this album come from? As the chiller side of Eat Static, I was expecting some psy-dub rubs, or maybe a throwback cut that might have appeared on the old Planet Dog compilations. And the first few tracks do offer this, even getting Robbert Heynen of the former Psychick Warriors Ov Gaia in with Near Future Myth (dear Lord, such expansive sonics!). The back-end of CD2 then grows more ethnic, orchestrated, and wordly with the beats. There were hints of this sound on Back To Earth, but ol’ Merv’s taken things to another level here, sounding like latter-era Juno Reactor in some parts. I know I said hearing Eat Static without the quirkiness feels off, but if lush production like this is what we can also expect, I’m all for it.

Dead Planet as a whole is quite a bit to take in, but is well worth the investment for followers of the alien nation.

Arpatle - The Day After

Psychonavigation Records: 2012

Look, when I said my trawl of Psychonavigation Records' blowout sale would reveal some super obscure producers, I meant it. Wait, did I say that? I can't remember now. That big purchase was many months ago, with so much more having arrived in my towers since. My initial fears of an over-abundance of the Ireland label's material in my current backlog queue is moot, plenty more albums breaking up any potential monotony. Not that the albums I did get are redundant retreads of the same sounds, oh no! I'm amazed just how diverse Psychonavigation's proving to be, and that's including me totally ignoring all the shoegaze rock stuff. Maybe a little chillwave though.

Then, our obscure artist for the day is Patrick Bossink, or Arpatle to those buying his music. You might remember him from the Psychonavigation compilation Psychonavigation Sampler 2013, and the cassette Ik En Jij, Allebei from Yoshimi!. Oh come on, there’s no way you’ve heard that one. Maybe one of Arpatle’s other albums though, Continuum from 2009 on Family Garden Recordings, or the recently released Quapi on Offshoot Records. The Day After is the LP lodged between those two in his discography, and I’m really struggling with the background details of this guy, aren’t I? It’s the entire internet’s fault, hopelessly scarce in info surrounding him. Lord Discogs just has him down as an ambient producer from Holland. His website has even less info than that, merely a window to his releases on various online platforms. At least Mr. Bossink wrote a few more lines for his Last.fm biography, mentioning he’s been studying Music and Technologies at the Utrecht School Of Arts. Yeah, The Day After totally has the markings of an arts student.

If anything, Arpatle loves treating the studio as a mini symphony, utilizing unconventional tones, sounds, and instruments in crafting his music. Opener Solstitium has something of a Far East thing going for it, but uses an xylophone (or some mallet instrument, I’m no expert) for its lead, then goes into an extended dubbed-out excursion in the middle before returning to the twee melodies. Follow-up Crickets nabs some field recordings of nocturnal critters (I hear more frogs than crickets), then goes for a minimalist excursion through dubby tones and treatments. Third track goes drone with its effects, though has a chipper country mood about it, as though we’re riding along some Western setting on our horses. On acid.

To abstract, you know those interlude moments on Future Sound Of London albums, where they indulge themselves with sonic collages and experimental doodling? That’s what much of The Day After sounds like, though tighter in composition. Some tracks, like shoegazey Arctic Trip and the lush ambience of Wake Me Up, are quite the treat for the ears. Others, like ultra-minimalist Headache and spacious Satie’s Birthday (so much space!), instead come off as Arpatle having some art-house fun in his studio. It’s all quite pleasant, though lacking musical muscle to stay lodged in your head for long.

Perturbator - Dangerous Days

Blood Music: 2014

So synthwave's now a thing. Who knows if this neo-'80s scene has much longevity – it's not like electroclash lasted a significant amount of time – but as we are, there's a growing fascination with the decade that brought us neon-glazed urban dystopia. Mostly following in the footsteps of Jan Hammer, John Carpenter, and a whole lotta’ Sega racing games, it's sole purpose is in recreating the soundtracks of every D-grade sci-fi pulp movie and splatter-slasher flick from the '80s, many of which are lost to time and degraded VHS tapes. Initially a digital market, it’s gained enough traction that a few names have large enough followings that some labels are investing significant pressing factory time. Perturbator, or James Kent on his Delorean insurance papers, has been one of the scene’s biggest names, and became a de facto ambassador of the darker end of synthwave thanks to the popularity of his contributions to the Hotline Miami video game series.

So popular is Perturbator that he can release multiple collector’s represses of vinyl and cassette, and folks will keep snatching them up. Dangerous Days, his third full-length, has some nineteen variations released, and you just know there’s a die-hard or two who’s gathered every record, CD, and tape. Man, Blood Music sure knows how to cater to obsessives.

What’s set Perturbator apart from all the other bedroom synthwave wibblers is his know-how in the album domain. Each LP could serve as the soundtrack of a feature-length flick (likely financed by The Cannon Group, Inc.), but Mr. Kent doesn’t get so wrapped up in retro navel gazing as many synthwavers go. He instead uses the fantastical urban pulp of yore as a starting point to go in his own way, creating his own vision of helmeted vigilantes confronting the cyborg ruling class controlled by mega-corporations, and all that good rot. Hey, it’s right there in his Dangerous Days’ liner notes, a detailed screed setting the tone and theme of the music within. C’mon, I just know you wanna’ see the movie now.

Pft, no motion picture is required with this album. Just take your standard neo-‘80s tropes and paint the imagery yourself. Aw yeah, Perturbator’s Theme sees him cruising down the rain-soaked dark alleys. Future Club finds our vigilante scoping out the seedy underground looking for hot tips and cool tricks. Hard Wired brings us a touch of detached romance in a cold, cruel, chrome city. The robots are on the counter-attack in Humans Are Such Easy Prey. High octane chases sequences with nitro-turbo on Complete Domination. A quiet, reflective moment in Last Kiss, before the all-out assault with the titular twelve-minute climax to Dangerous Days. Right, something like all that.

Of course, almost all of synthwave fosters such iconography, practically to a fault. Perturbator does it better than most though, and having Blood Music as his graphic designer certainly helps set him above the pack. If you’re curious what this scene has to offer, Dangerous Days is as solid a starting point as any.

Lorenzo Montanà - Black Ivy

Fax +49-69/450464/Psychonavigation Records: 2009/2015

For a chap who’s relatively flown under the radar, Lorenzo Montanà’s built up quite the remarkable discography for himself. He got his break releasing this particular album back in Fax +49-69/450464’s waning days, but more impressively released five LPs titled Labyrinth with Pete Namlook. Meanwhile, Mr. Montanà found the time to release a second full-length, Serpe, on the label before they were forced to shut doors following Mr. Kaulmann’s untimely death. This all happened within the span of three years! I know the Namlookian One could draw several sessions out of well-known musicians (Klaus Schulz, Move D, Bill Laswell, etc.) but it’s damn cool he continued doing it even with new cats on the scene too. He must have had quite the synergy going with ol’ Lorenzo to rattle off so much music with him in such a short amount of time.

When Fax+ folded, Mr. Montanà migrated over to Psychonavigation Records, where he continues releasing albums at an impressive clip. Somehow they rescued his two solo releases from legal limbo as a 2CD reissue, which is technically what I’m reviewing here now. But Black Ivy is a ‘B’ album, while Serpe is an ‘S’ album, so part two of this double release will have to wait a month (really).

So now that I’ve namedropped a couple labels and producers with clearly recognizable music styles (Psychonavigation is recognizable on this blog now, yes?), that saves me some word count in describing Mr. Montanà’s work here. Because this is some difficult stuff to detail, believe you me. Not that Black Ivy is over-produced with micro-edits and the like, his forays into clicky minimalism quite tasteful and easy to take in - it kinda’ rests in the Venn diagram where classic ambient techno ends and modern IDM starts. His rhythms run the range from jazzy skitters (Erasing You, Kirkuk Lake, Misteries Of Nature) to downtempo click-glitch (Insect Invasion, Haliaras) to steady techno pulse (Sap 2, Dionaea, Black Ivy). Everything’s coupled with lush melodic pieces, usually melancholic and nicely wide-screened for an optimal listening experience. Not that I’d expect less from someone who made multi-channel albums with Namlook.

Despite these nice things said about Black Ivy, you’ve undoubtedly detected a hint of apathy with my words above. Two points of contention then. First, though this is a 2009 release, for some reason I keep thinking it’s from much earlier, say 2001-ish. The mild glitch production does keep it firmly current, but the ideas have me thinking material from a decade earlier. Did Mr. Montanà have a ton of stored, unreleased material before debuting with this?

It’d explain my other quibble with Black Ivy, in that this album doesn’t feel like an album-LP, just a collection of finely crafted tracks. Certainly nothing wrong with that, and I’d be amazed if ol’ Lorenzo knocked it out of the park on his first go. It’s a debut that shows tons of future promise in his career, just in need of some refinement with the format.

Liquid Stranger - The Arcane Terrain

Interchill Records: 2011

In his near decade of music making, Liquid Stranger has shown no fear in tackling any and all forms of bass heavy dub beats. Sometimes this has led him to the realms of psy-dub or dancehall grime, but other times he's wilfully tackled teeth-grinding dubsteb too. And while I know full well to avoid his (probable) bro'd out endeavours on Rottun, that doesn't mean his material on other labels won't have instances to the stuff either. Even Interchill Records, they of so much world beat vibes, couldn't be completely resistant to it. Fact is if you’re releasing any form of bass music in British Columbia, you have to show your hand on what aspects of dubstep you can bring. The market is just too big, too involved, to completely ignore it. And if ever there was a year to sell-out to that scene completely, it’d be ye’ olde time of 2011, when dubstep was brought screeching into popular discourse by a stray Skr-r-r-r-r-rillex. Thus, this was Mr. Stääf’s big chance to show me how versatile he truly was, whether he could drop a dubstep album on my ears with all these potentially disastrous elements at play.

Oh, who am I kidding? This is all just coincidence. I picked The Arcane Terrain up because the cover intrigued me, as quirky covers so often do. Artist and label aside, I’m still not sure how this wasn’t a forest psy CD.

And while that ‘show me’ angle does have some truth, it’s all pretty much moot Yes, at times The Arcane Terrain sounds like it’s an album entirely geared for the festival circuit. That doesn’t mean it’s a dubstep love-in, Liquid Stranger more often than not getting his muse on with the dancehall side of dub than anything else. That still leaves him with some annoyingly barebones tracks though, like second track Bombaclaad Star, nothing going for it than a steady hand-waving bop and an occasional mid-range fill (MC Shells’ toasting is hopelessly dull); y’know, the scene of every cliché dubstep party ever. Other tracks like Steam and Timeless follow this template too, but if Liquid Stranger was just a one-trick pony in this vein, I’d never have started digging into his discography in the first place.

I could have done without the protest-grime cuts Rise and Babylon Beast, but cool on Mr. Stääf’s part in getting KRS-One and Killah Priest on these tracks. My jam though, is always the pure reggae roots of dub music, with The Molecule Man and Vigilante doing the deed just fine. We also get some dabbling into bhangra (Totem, Laguna), gitch-chill (Overlord), trip-hop (The Squid Strander), and whatever’s going on with Zero Gravity (Balearic chill-grime?). More than ever, it shows how diverse Liquid Stranger can go, even when he doesn’t have to.

The Arcane Terrain is probably still too dubsteppy for those who can’t stand the stuff, but if you have some tolerances for the mid-range wobbles, there’s plenty other dubbed-out tunes to satisfy your ears.