Various - Soma Records: 20 Years (Soma Classics)

Soma Quality Recordings: 2011

Has there been any UK label more influential than Soma Quality Recordings? Yes, yes there has. Many more, in fact, and I could name-drop a dozen of them off the top of my head. I won't, though, because this is supposed to be a summation of Soma, a label that often likens itself as Very Important, but is honestly more like Kinda' Important. Still, they've released a lot of classic tech-house and techno over the years, and was a go-to source for many top progressive house jocks from the lands of Britannica. They've been steady homes for Slam, The Black Dog (Phase II), Samuel L Session, Silicone Soul, Funk D'Void, and DeepChord. Soma also introduced me to one of my all-time favourite artists of the past decade in Vector Lovers, and that's gotta' count for something. Oh, and a French house duo got their break on this label too, though they were quickly lured away by big Virgin dollars, so we needn't talk about them.

Oh, fine, I guess I must. I mean, it's practically the selling point of this 20 Years blowout, plastered all over the front cover. Frankly, I was more excited getting an unmixed version of their rub on Scott Grooves' Mothership Reconnection, one of the last before becoming robots. All that prime-era French filter funk in full effect, mmmm... Oh, right, the exclusive, unreleased cut, made before even Da Funk, when they were still doing hard acid house with Conor Dalton. Okay, my review of Daft Punk's Drive: it's a'ight.

I have half the tunes on the Soma Classics disc already, but in DJ mixes, so it's nice having them mostly in their full, original versions. Kinda' gutted that Desert Storm from Desert Storm is missing the intro portion with the war dialog and tasty pads on their own, but since this CD maximizes its runtime, some space needed saving.

Three Slam tracks make the cut (thumping acid techno of Positive Education, loopy hypnotic techno of Azure, Pt. 1, and vintage Balaeric progressive house of Eterna), because it's their label, damn it. And no Soma classics CD would be complete without inclusions from Silicone Soul (Right On, Right On), Funk d'Void (Diabla, though the lighter Heavenly Mix instead), The Black Dog (Cost II, by way of a 2007 reissue loophole since the 1993 original came out on General Production Recordings), Percy X (X-Trak 1 letting Detroit know that Soma recognizes the roots), and Samuel L Session. Interestingly, Mr. Session's Can You Relate is the only nod to then-contemporary bloopy tech-house on this CD, and by way of the Joris Voorn Flooding The Market With Remixes remix. Unsurprisingly, it's the least interesting cut here.

Of course, this is hardly the full Soma story, many names and tracks not included here. Fortunately, two additional DJ mixes handled by Slam and Silicone Soul come with this package, filling in those gaps to various degrees. Check in to Part Two of this review for the details!

God Body Disconnect - Sleeper's Fate

Cryo Chamber: 2017

Definitely a surprise that Bruce Moallem returned to the story arc he started in Dredge Portals. How much is left to tell about a man lost in a coma? We've already explored the past memories, the self-reflections, and the damning judgments. All that remains is the final climb up Jacob's ladder, but the last track off Dredge Portals made it clear the narrator wasn't destined for such a fate any time soon, trapped in a forever loop wandering his own psychosis. And perhaps that still remains, though taking in Sleeper's Fate, I get a sense there's conclusion here, a new path taken behind a previously locked door. Literally, one of the many field recordings being a key unlocking a door.

Y'know, I'm not so sure I can call what God Body Disconnect does with sounds is field recordings. When most producers make use of such sounds, it's as sonic dressing, ambient canvasing, and other 'aural painting' analogies you may think of. You may hear babbling brooks or falling rain or stampeding wildebeest, but it's all in service of setting mood and tone for the composition being presented, seldom a narrative device. Mr. Moallem, however, is so precise and focused in his use of such sounds, it's like I'm watching a movie play out without watching anything on a screen.

The opening titular cut, for instance, places us back at the scene of the narrator's attack. There's falling rain, distant thunder, radio chatter from nearby cop cars, a screaming ambulance arriving, and through it all, a dying man's haggard gasping breath, his throat choking from blood welling up through his mouth. And I'm right there, in this man's viewpoint, as vividly as though watching such images play out on celluloid. Only after this scene plays out do we get some music playing, a sombre piece of strings, pads, and echoing guitar, though even this feels like a 'credit roll' portion of the album before we return to the actual film.

Sleeper's Fate essentially plays out like this, long stretches of 'foley recordings' (can I call this a thing?), with the narrator traversing empty corridors and past hazy memories. It's not too dissimilar to Dredge Portals in that way, but whereas the atmosphere of that album could feel damning and claustrophobic, there's more sense of openness here, lighting once shadowed recesses of the narrator's state of mind.

To put a finer point on it, the whole reason our viewpoint character is stuck in a coma is because, no matter how much he thinks he wants death, he just can't let go of life. Sleeper's Fate is about finally giving in, and the release that provides. The back-half of this album features the most music, almost all of it the sort of soothing ambient that's antithetical to a dark ambient label. Has our narrator awoken from his torturous Hell? Is he walking in the literal Garden Of Eden? Guess we'll have to wait for a third God Body Disconnect for an answer.

Seaworthy - Sleep Paths

Slaapwel Records: 2012

Ah, hm. Feel like I've gone into a rut here. The whole point of doing this alphabetical sequence is to prevent such things, to keep every subsequent item different from the last. And sure, there's times where runs of similar-sounding albums can't be helped – the 'Trance' month of 2016, for instance – but such instances are generally rare and at least expected when the moment comes. I never intended for so many shortish ambient releases to bunch up like this, and were they in my original regular queue, they'd at least be spaced out a little more. Or maybe not, items like Selected Ambient Works, Slumberland, Signals, and Solar Walk also among these 'S' albums. Maybe there's just something ambient composers are drawn to in this region of the alphabet, a physiological state of being that works well with ambient music. 'Smiling', that must be it.

So we return quite quickly to Slaapwel Records for another outing of single-song, lullaby music. No, seriously, that's what Sleep Paths is, a forty minute composition the 'electro-acoustic post-rock' band Seaworthy wrote as a beddy-bye time soundtrack for guitarist Cameron Webb's newborn child. Forty minutes is too long for such needs though, especially when so very little actually happens in this piece.

From the outset, you hear super-soft electric guitar plucking, gentle whispers of mechanical breathing, all the while droning reverb and delay effects blanket everything in a minimalist melodic haze. And that's it for the entire duration, cottony sounds meandering along without a care in the world, floating along a river of fluffy clouds. It's impossible to pay attention to Sleep Paths without your mind wandering even after a dozen minutes of this, and Seaworthy stretch things out as long as most toddlers are willing to nap for. I can't imagine anyone even playing such music live without nodding off themselves, gazing at their shoes to the point they've doubled over and passed out on their feet. At least Simon Scott's offering for Slaapwel had a sense of progression from start to finish.

Not that I'm saying Sleep Paths is terrible or boring or anything – it do what it supposed to do, and it do it well. It unfortunately leaves me with almost no talking points. Lucky for me, however, there was a Bandcamp bonus with this CD, Sleep Paths II, which has more going on than the original piece.

For one, it runs at a 'brisk' twenty-nine minutes, which makes better sense as a 'falling asleep' composition (if you haven't naturally nodded off after that long, music ain't gonna' help). Two, while the basic acoustic-droning elements remain, there's rhythm here, clinky percussion panning across the channels throughout. Sleep Paths II also changes form after a while, more prominent guitar plucking and layers of static fuzz added towards the end. Seems to defeat the purpose of sleeping music to have your piece grow more dynamic as it progresses, but hey, at least it gives me more to wax words over.

36 - Sine Dust Versions

3six Recordings: 2015

Wait wait wait!!! Dennis Huddleston released a single with Saturn on the cover!? Yeah, guy, a mini-series at that. Awww, man, it's like 36 knows me or something, my one true weakness for any artwork. Can't say I would buy the vinyl of Sine Dust or Tomorrow's Explorers though, if anything because they're already out of stock and jacked up on the open market now. At least I still get to hear tunes off those records on the bonus CD of Black Soma, but I cannot deny those Sine Dust copies do look exquisite.

While crafting the four tracks of that particular EP, Dennis made alternates, mostly as a means to explore various ideas or paths on each before settling on the finished versions. Not that this is a unique thing musicians do, especially ambient ones, but unless they're the sort who'll release every and anything that strikes their muse, it isn't often they'll make such works available. Given how immaculately produced 36's finished material typically is, I'm surprised he's even letting us hear his alternate pieces, but I guess he figured there was enough to differentiate them from the originals.

Either that, or he just wanted to show off more Saturn porn, which I'm totally fine with. I mean, just look at that beauty shot, the golden globe hovering in space so majestically, its rings stretched out and enhanced. Yeah, I don't think that's an actual Cassini photo, probably a composite. Plus, if you stare really closely, you'll notice concentric lines encircling the planet, as though the light from the background stars are being warped by gravitational forces. In fact, the whole top half of this picture looks more like painting smudges. It's all quite subtle, the sort of thing you won't notice unless paying attention. Hey, kinda' like where 36 takes his music with Sine Dust Versions!

The originals were some of 36's most focused pieces of melancholic music – I'm sure I mentioned as such in regards to the titular track which also appeared on Void Dance. The associated tracks on the single generally followed in Sine Dust's mould, and so it goes with Versions too. Only in this case, tones and melody are drawn and stretched out such that each composition is turned into lengthy pieces of drone, sometimes doubling their runtime in the process.

On one hand, this definitely falls more in line with the type of ambient you'd expect of a space music outing, especially with a lonely Saturn against as stark, empty black backdrop. Whereas the originals could melt your heart, these may leave you feeling lonesome and cold. Hell, the ghostly vocal of Sine Dust is essentially non-existent in its Version counterpart, though Sun Riders Part II (Version) does retain some moving moments in its droning timbre. I wouldn't recommend this EP for anyone other than 36 followers though, which was the intent behind releasing it anyhow – offering a glimpse of different angles Mr. Huddleston's takes his musical ideas.

Simon Scott - Silenne

Slaapwel Records: 2010

So this is a quaint little label's I've stumbled upon, and boy, do I mean 'little'. Operating out of Belgium, Slaapwel Records has been in the game for a decade now, with a grand total of only thirteen items released. Even at their early 'peak', they barely managed two a year, and have been downright lethargic these past few trips around Sol. Makes one wonder whether they've taken that “music to fall asleep to” manifesto all too well. Still, it's not like Slaapwel's a major enterprise either, their CDs coming off like they were made in the art studio of someone's cottage home, simple high-grade cardboard sleeves with ink-stamped type-face, and a pretty picture literally stitched on the cover. It's any wonder they have enough market share such that I discovered them at all.

Discover I did though, on account of following a lead through Lord Discogs, which led me to their Bandcamp, from which I could order actual physical copies of musiks from their offices. And to think such a thing would have been night impossible ten years ago. Truly astounding times we live in.

That particular lead was Dag Rosenqvist, who's Jasper TX project was any early contribution to Slaapwel's skint catalogue. Another chap who he'd collaborated with was Simon Scott, who also released an album with this label. Simon's biggest claim to fame is one of the early members of seminal shoegaze band Slowdive, and he's flitted among various other bands and projects over the years since (The Giant Polar Bears among the most amusingly named of them). At the start of the current decade, he started releasing material under his own name, Silenne on Slaapwel his third of such efforts. Seems like an odd choice, but since ol' Dag had done the deed as well, Mr. Scott felt it was a decent enough label for a tidy little one-off piece of his own.

And that's essentially what Silenne is, a thirty-three minute long single composition that maintains Slaapwel's stated aim of slumber-inducing sonic bliss. The opening portions of the tune mostly consists of a simple, gentle, looping acoustic melody with delay effects bridging each loop. A soft, low thrum of bass breathes every so often, and vinyl crackles add a sense of randomness as things play out, as though Scott's recording this while clearing stress-filled cobwebs from your head. Eh, I'm not feeling sleepy, just need to give my eyes a little break, y'know. Staring at a computer screen can be taxing and all.

The acoustic plucking gradually fades into a steady drone, receding from the fringes of your consciousness. Assuming you haven't gone to the land of Nod by this point, the remaining two-thirds of Silenne slowly ebbs out with soft timbre and fuzzy effects so subtle and trance-inducing, you'd have to be strung out on amphetamines to not zone out. It's weird saying losing one's attention in the second-half of a lengthy composition is the point, but here we are.

Ras Command - Serious Smokers (The Best Of Ras Command)

Waveform Records: 2000

Ambient dub may have been the foundation Waveform built their early success on, but that don't mean they had no love for the roots of dub music either. I'm talking that righteous irie rude-b'woy Jamaican reggae, mon'. After Phase 1 of the label's existence came to a close (re: had finally tapped out of material exported from Beyond), they were mostly left wandering about in search of their next course of action. For a time, it looked as though they would explore the separate facets of ambient and dub, first with Slumberland, then with Earthjuice. And boy, did Waveform figure Earthjuice was gonna' be a thing, proudly stamping a Volume 1 on it, and flooding the stores with copies. Every time I went on Big City Sojourns to take new musiks back with me to the Canadian Hinterlands, there was Earthjuice, its tropical trees in a rasta-man frame staring back at me. Can't say I was terribly intrigued by it though, my ears demanding the unexpected and unheard - Jamaican dub music isn't known for its diversity.

One individual from that compilation that Waveform seemed keen on was Alex Buchal (aka: Ras Command; aka: Cee-Mix; aka: Kong Fu; aka: L-X; aka: Third Coming; aka: Q-Clones). A German by stock and trade, he mostly peddled in dub music, though dabbled in the realms of d'n'b too, releasing some four albums and a dozen singles across his aliases. He was also suffering from cancer, and passed on early 2000. A couple months after, this 'best of' collection emerged from Waveform. I'm not sure whether the label and Alex were already in the works for such a release, or it was put together after the fact as a tribute - some liner notes regarding this matter would have been helpful.

As for the music, it's about as you'd expect of a reggae dub outing. The sounds are sparse, letting all those echo, reverb, delay, phase, and flange effects on the pianos, melodica, and rhythms breathe and exhale to their heart's content. And they take a heaping toke with every splash of snare, believe you me. Plus, that bass! There's some serious sub-frequency action going on here, my friends, low-ends that only the choicest speakers will properly register. Play these tracks on regular ol' computer or laptop outputs, and there's nothing there, absolutely nothing. This is bass for the true believers, not poseurs who think bass is a mid-range noise.

Most of the tracks come from the two Ras Command In Dub albums, some of which get rather brisk in tempo. A couple cuts from his Cee Mix project that skews more trip-hop also appear, as does the exclusive Love Dub (Drum Mix) cut from Earthjuice. That's about all I have to say with Serious Smokers though. Like I said, it's reggae dub, the most predictable style of downtempo out there. Is it ever the most perfect music for ultra-laidback vibes about though.

36 - Seconds & Forever

3six Recordings: 2016

I've settled upon a New Year's Resolution: don't be so anal about buying MP3s anymore. I really can't justify being against it as in years past. There's a lot of wonderful music out there, but without ample funds behind it, a great deal of it simply isn't viable in the physical medium, often limited to small, collector runs at best. And when some of those runs stick to the vinyl option – a medium I must resist because I know it will financially ruin me – I've effectively and stubbornly cut myself off for decade-old petty reasons. Well, enough of that, I say. Bandcamp has provided me with an outlet I feel comfortable paying monies for musiks with – direct compensation to artists. And while I'll hold out as long as possible for CD options, I shouldn't feel beholden to it either when the high-quality MP3 is right there at a cheaper price too. Obviously I'm not gonna' go on a spending spree of MP3s now, but should a discount offer pop up for an item I know I'll never buy in physical (sold out, wrong format, etc.), well, sure, why not, eh?

Okay. Let's now dig into this mini-album from 36, a vinyl release which I bought as a high-quality MP3 from his Bandcamp because there was a discount code available. I'm so easy...

Really, of the short list of artists I'd be willing to take this route, Dennis Huddleston's 36 project is near the top, especially since he self-releases so much material. Seconds & Forever, though, appears to be one of the few items he's put out on a separate label. That same year, he released The Infinity Room on the semi-popular label-blog A Strangely Isolated Place, but Mystic & Quantum is a regular ol' print running out of Spain. They're relatively new, only a handful of records in their catalogue, but have LPs from the likes of DMX Krew and VHS Glitch to their name. 36 is an odd addition, his ambient nothing like the synthy electro and techno Mystic & Quantum peddle in. Why, if you tilt your ears in just the right direction when playing back Seconds & Forever, you'll hear the sounds of worlds colliding.

As for the music, yeah, it's more ambient from 36. Consisting to two eighteen minute pieces (one for each side of the record, 'natch), Part 1 takes a little to build. As it gradually emerges from the lowest registers of human hearing, however, you can tell it's gonna' be another lovely, pleasant, heart-warming composition of layered pads. I initially had shades of Vangelis' Creation du Monde when first hearing this, though 36's dense timbre soon puts that comparison to rest. Part 2 goes in an opposite direction from Part 1, a subdued and sombre melody maintaining a general through-line, as additional layers of strings come and go. Overall more calm and gentle, letting you drift into melancholy thought. Works best while gazing through winter windows.

ACE TRACKS: December 2017

That's another Gregorian calendar done, and there's one thing I can say I'm truly disappointed in this past orbit of Sol. No, not American politics, I got over that almost immediately – if anything, things could have turned out even worse if they didn't have some of the densest idiots running that daycare circus. Some other projects kinda' stalled this year, but that's not entirely in my hands, so I can let that slide. And while the world has had its ups and downs, I'm strangely okay with how things are heading. Maybe it's blinkered optimism or complacency, but for all the rough, nasty crap folks had to endure, I feel like it was as though lancing a festering boil that had grown into a vicious tumour, a necessary operation for things to get better. It was a year of shitty people over-reaching with their shittiness, and actually getting called out for it, some even suffering consequences from it. It's a start.

No, what irks me the most about 2017 is it was somehow my least productive year, at least with regards to this blog. Of these past five years, I've generated the least amount of new reviews, and while that's partly due to taking a month off, that doesn't provide my only excuse. Hell, I did the same in 2014, and still cranked out a bunch of reviews then. And yes, other projects did take up some time, but I was still taking college classes in 2013, which were just as much a distraction as anything. Really, I got nothing, the lower review turnout just an inexplicable happenstance of the year 2017. And of course, this means I'm somehow still not finished with my regular alphabetical run. This decade though, I promise!

Anyhow, here's the ACE TRACKS for December of 2017.


Full track list here.


MISSING ALBUMS:
WestBam - The Roof Is On Fire
Various - Quinq
SiJ & Item Caligo - Queer Reminiscence
Out Of The Box - Out Of The Box
Various - Nu Balance
Lorenzo Montanà - Nihil

Percentage Of Hip-Hop: 0%
Percentage Of Rock: 4%
Most “WTF?” Track: If not Oak Ridge Boys again, maybe Wednesday Campanella, just for how unexpected it is.

Yep, three months later, and the alphabetical backlog is still chugging along. I've only just hit the 'S' portion of it now, and trust me, like it's regular queue brother, 'S' is a beast – will take me at least half a month to get through that. Then it's onto 'T', 'U', etc. I'd like to say I'll be finished with everything by spring, but, y'know...

Sine Silex - Schachmatt

Werkstatt Recordings: 2016

Anna Michailidou must be the hardest working madame in underground coldwave synth-pop right now. Right, that's an incredibly micro-niche avenue to take residence in, but since diving into Werkstatt Records' catalogue, I've continuously seen her name crop up. Already a member of Resistance Of Independent Music and Paradox Obscur, she's also taken up a solo career as Kriistal Ann, and has added her gothic croon to many other synthwave acts out there, a feature on GosT's Non Paradisi perhaps her greatest exposure yet.

Another is a three-piece act called Factice Factory. These chaps from France and the Alps mostly stick to a strict diet of minimalist coldwave, so Ms. Ann's voice was a natural fit with their aesthetic. Guess Anna liked working with lead singer François Ducarn enough such that they formed their own minimalist synth-pop duo called Sine Silex, a change of pace from the heavier, EBM-leaning sound she typically makes with Toxic Razor.

For some stupid reason, the first duo I drew comparisons with was Miss Kittin & The Hacker. While both make use of a stripped-down synth-pop sound heavily influenced from the early '80s, that's where the similarities end. For one, Mr. Ducarn sings, and Mr. Hacker never uttered a word. Also, while you could say both groups' lyrics carry a certain detachment to them, MK&tH did so in a deadpan, cynical way. I get no such irony from Sine Silex, François and Kriistal performing their music as straight-faced as this can get. I mean, such minimalist music works best when the performers are stripped of emotion as well, but those electroclash sorts always kept a wink and a wry smile while doing so. This are serious cold-synth pop-wave, yo'.

Actually, I'm not sure just how serious Sine Silex are being half the time, on account François and Kriistal don't sing in English all the time, sometimes going French, and perhaps other Euro languages I'm too dumb to detect. For that matter, Ms. Ann's accent is so thick that I don't always understand her anglophone lyrics either. Not that I'm complaining, her gothic voice such a unique attribute among so many synth-poppers, that their content isn't as much a selling point as their delivery. Besides, it's kinda' funny hearing her on bouncier tunes like Operative and Modeliste (a requisite nod to Kraftwerk's The Model) when so much of her work oozes the black phantasmic.

Most of the tunes on Schachmatt play to her strengths though, even if her vocals have more a supporting role to François' lead. There's the slower, melodramatic songs (Antidote, L'Embrun), the brisk EBM-leaning cuts (Ether, Six To Twenty Seconds, Nénuphar), plus tracks that indulge the desolate goth-pop that's right up Kriistal's cobble-stone pathway (Les Nimbes, Rifle, L'Amnésie). It's also all very simple music, only a few synthesizers and sequencers running at a given time. You'd have to be a dedicated fan of this sound to enjoy it, but I find it strangely alluring, like walking a digitized path through an abyssal plain.

Various - Saint-Germain-Des-Prés Café Vol. 5

Wagram Music: 2004

Though I'm hardly a nu-jazz connoisseur, I like it enough that I don't mind springing for a compilation or two if I stumble upon them on the cheap. And Saint-Germain-Des-Prés Café is classy enough that you know you're in safe hands even as a complete rube. This is now the third CD from the series I've bought, and oddly enough, I've only picked up odd-numbered volumes thus far. What is this, some sort of subconscious reverse Star Trek movie selection? Actually, that would be darn hilarious if the even-numbered volumes of Saint-Germain-Des-Prés Café were somehow significantly worse than the odd-numbered ones. I don't even know how that'd be possible, since nu-jazz tends to maintain a steady modicum of talent and skill to perform it. Maybe supreme jazz experts could tell the difference of quality between each performed piece, but for most of us plebs, it's all the same, laid-back, cool chillin' vibe. Still, I'm tempted to make my next purchase in this series be Saint-Germain-Des-Prés Café 7, just to keep this accidental pattern going. OCD... compels...

So while some familiar nu-jazz sounds and artist staples re-appear for this fifth go-around (De-Phazz! DJ Cam! Dzihan & Kamien! Norah Jones! Gotan Project! Meitz?), something new has also been added. Or rather, something old, but new for the series: real jazz. As in, traditional instruments, classic 'cool' performances (or whatever that late '50s – early '60s development was), and nary a synthesizer in sight. Not just a one or two-off either, but chunks of this CD devoted to it. Street Of Dreams with Stacey Kent & Jan Lundgren Trio is exactly the sort of jazz you probably instinctively think of when the term is thrown about. Brisa Roché does a tidy little vocal-bop number featuring a trumpet solo. Chet Baker adds his sad trumpet to Gotan Project's soft Parisian soul 'Round About Midnight.

And some of these tunes, I swear tricked me into thinking they were performed au naturale, so smooth these producers are in their trade. Like, David Borsu's Late Nite Swing sounds like a regular ol' soul-jazz jam with the drummer and the trumpeter and the keyboarder and the singer and all; but no, it's a Belgium DJ fusing a bunch of elements together, though I think the vocal snippets of numbers should have clued me in sooner. Koop adds Astor Piazzolla's bandeoneon (aka: comedy-sized accordion) for a tidy tango ditty in Veulvo Al Sur. Then there's Nicola Conte's Bossa Ahead Remix of Eli Goulart E Bando Do Mato's Meu Samba (so many consonants), sounding not a touch out of place from whatever Latin jazz musics you fancy. Makes me wonder if the 'remix' tag is even necessary. Rearrangement, mayhaps?

Of course, there's the obligatory tunes with a heavier emphasis on jazzy drum programming (Slow Train Soul's Inna City Woman), or dubby funk (Refactoy's Yo Solo Queiro, Patchworks' Deep Ocean). Through it all though, you'll definitely come away with a craving for a mocha and croissant. Preferably by a seaside vista.