Convextion - 2845

a.r.t.less: 2016

No way I was gonna' skip out on this. Cover art like that must be respected, nurtured, supported, encouraged, and... Well, not replicated, but I'd love to see more airbrushed, pulp sci-fi on techno releases. Why should space-synth have all the glory? I mean, just look at details on that interstellar cruiser. The little lights, splayed all about in no discernible pattern or form, but you know there's a reason that one is red and that row is blue and that grouping is yellow. I could fanwank theory forever on what's going on with this cover art, especially all over a full-sized, spiffy vinyl edition. Unfortunately, I don't collect vinyl, and as it seems there's almost no chance of a CD version of this record (it's been three years since its release now), I had to settle for digital instead. Yeah, this was among my earliest 'floodgates' purchases, why do you ask?

And who is the space maverick taking techno back to its cosmic roots, rescuing it from the clutches of the evil MNML Galactic Empire? Why, none other than Gerard Hanson, not really a very important person in the world of techno. That was mostly intentional though, the Texan preferring the anonymity of a scene that had its eyes and ears fixated on Detroit and Germany. He released a few records as Convextion in the mid-'90s, with sporadic singles emerging in the following years, but seemed to have moth-balled the project after a self-titled retrospective album. He was more focused on his electro alias E.R.P. at that point anyway, and with techno so enamoured with sterile German minimalism, his retro-future style didn't have much place.

Then, out of the blue, this! I guess the time was finally right for techno in this style to regain its shine. Like, if B12 could make a comeback, why not Convextion? I wouldn't go so far as to say Mr. Hanson's been on a tear since releasing 2845, but he's certainly had one of the highest profiles in recent years within this particular niche of the scene. Probably a lot of anticipation for what sort of lovely cover art his next album will have!

Of course, all this hype wouldn't exist if there wasn't damn good music to go along with it. Even though the sixteen-minute opener has more in common with the dubbier explorations of a print like Silent Season, New Horizon has enough sci-fi bleeps and zaps penetrating the murky echo-space to fixate it solidly in cosmic domains. Or Atlantian, in a pinch (yeah, there's a Drexciyan vibe to this particular track).

The remaining six tracks are all about as solid offerings of vintage Detroit techno as you could hope for in this day and age. I really can't detail it any more than that, as the genre just has that particular sound that tickles the frontal cortex just right, especially if you vibe on the proper spaced-out variants of the sound. Only preaching to the choir at this point, my friends.

Harlequins Enigma - Brooding Brains In Vain

self released: 2019

(a Patreon Request from Åge Riisnes)

I don't dig very far into the realm of New Age music, almost entirely due to my early explorations of the genre didn't impress me much. Sure, you had the Kitaros and the Vangeliseses of the scene, but such artists have expansive works crossing multiple genres throughout their careers. No, I'm talking the 'real' stuff, which you'd find on lonesome tapes in spiritual healing shops on a counter beside faith crystals and aromatherapy tinctures. Very under-produced, is what I'm getting at, and while one could admire the punkish hustle in getting such music out on the market, my ears simply weren't having it, needing something a little more polished (dubby?) to do the business for me.

What's kinda' remarkable about such early, primitive music efforts in New Age is how even that found itself something of a retro revival, right down its aesthetic and means of distribution. Yeah, that whole vaporwave thing, but I'm talkin' digital store fronts and streaming services opening the floodgates for every manner of hopeful producer gaining wider audiences.

Still, just putting your stuff out on the internet and expecting results is ludicrous without some hustle. If your chosen music scene is as long and storied as New Age, it's gonna' take a fair amount of hustle to get noticed in an overstuffed market. And this here Harlequins Enigma sure has been on a hustling spree this past decade, getting his music out on streaming services while working whatever connections he has in the music business to get some top-tier collaborations underneath his belt, all the while remaining completely independent. I'm talkin' Vangelis, Kitaro, Schulze, Jarre, Mode, 'Werk, Amos! At least, that's what a number of Discoggian credits say. I don't know the extent of how these collaborations went down.

Oh, I guess I should also mention Harlequins Enigma's hustle has even gone to such lengths as to pay me Patreon money for a review. Wasn't that known as 'payola', back in the day? Only if I had nothing but insincere praise for the music, and y'all know I'd never do that, right?

Brooding Brains In Vain is a compilation of older Harlequins Enigma music, mostly cribbing music from such albums like Lyra, Heartbeat, Stargazer, and Octagon Volume 1 – Phase 7. Some of it's serviceable New Age music done in an old-school way (oh man, can I tell whenever Kitaro's muse is about), some of it sounds like it could have used more time in the mixdown process, and some of it left me scratching my head (are those... brostep belches in The Tattering Norm?).

What really threw me for a loop, though, was the track sequencing. For some reason, Åge put everything into alphabetical order, creating more than a couple wonky transitions between tracks. I at first thought I'd somehow downloaded the album incorrectly, but nope, it's like that on the Bandcamp page too. What sort of silly goose makes a track sequence in alphabetical order?

Ringo Sheena - Muzai Moratorium

Eastworld: 1999

(a Patreon Request from Philoi)

Even for some of the items that are well outside my wheelhouse, this one's practically lost over the horizon from my usual vantage point. Sure, I've touched upon J-pop plenty of times, but much of that has lineage from Western music, so it's not much of a leap for me to wax the bull about such releases on a purely 'dumb' level. Even the scant offerings of Japanese alternative rock I've covered at least borrows elements of shoegazey indie, which has enough ties to some forms of electronic music that I could at least bluff my way through it. And while I don't go out of my way to play much Western alternative rock for myself, I can't help but absorb it through cultural osmosis no matter where I live on this continent. Like, even the most back-ass, evangelical hubs, where they listen to nothing but gospel and Christian music – there's always a Christian version of alternative rock music.

J-pop grunge though? I don't know where to begin with this. Never would I have thought the brick-walled racket of Nirvana and Stone Temple Pilots could merge with Japanese vocals. Even the nation's version of screechy noise-punk makes more sense to me than this, the Japanese famous for taking Western ideas to absurdist, extreme levels.

I suppose I can at least start with who Ringo Sheena is, though I admit I'm doing nothing more than reiterating Wikipedia talking points here. Yes, I am once again dealing with a Japanese artist/musician/song-writer that is super-huge in their native homeland, but has almost no market penetration where I'm from. Or maybe a little bit, seeing as how I reside on the Pacific Rim and all. Surely a Japanaese star with two decades under her belt has a fanbase in Vancouver, especially with a major, global label backing her.

That's getting a little ahead of myself though. We're here with her debut Muzai Moratorium (aka: Innocence Moratorium; aka: 無罪モラトリアム), released on stalwart Japanese print Eastworld, which she apparently wrote and released while still a teenager. Well, in Japanese terms, that's not that impressive, what with their teen demographic often called upon to save the city/nation/universe (sorry, couldn't resist that one).

Seriously though, it's quite remarkable the amount of diversity on display here. Yeah, there's the pure noisy-rock turns (A View Of Happiness, Caution, Playing With Blocks, Kiss Me), but also stabs at ragtime (Queen Of Kabuki-cho, Marunouchi Sadistic) and j-pop balladry (Sid & Daydreams, Ordinary Night, Morphine), with assorted sprinklings of other genres littered throughout. 'Orient-techno' inPlaying With Blocks, discordant orchestras in Ordinary Night, etc.

Despite the level of production involved, Muzai Moratorium has quite the 'garage-rock' sheen to it, such that everything's rather bricked when listening to it. Half the time, I can't even make out Ringo's lyrics, even the English ones. Still, impressive use of rolling 'R's. I didn't know the Japanese could even do that!

Emiliana Torrini - Love In The Time Of Science

Virgin: 1999

(a Patreon Request from Omskbird)

I don't know much about Emiliana Torrini, but I've apparently heard her a couple times without realizing it. The most prominent example I've noticed in her 'Top Spotify Tracks' list is Gollum's Song, the closing credits theme to Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers. Now, even though I didn't get the soundtracks for those films (as lush as they are), I know I've heard that song in full, as I've watched the end credits all the way through, and the extended editions! If nothing else than for the lovely sketch artwork included during the runtime. Or simple movie viewing inertia. Gotta'... see... to... the... END!

More than that though, I know I've heard Ms. Torrini as far back as this particular album, even though I didn't know it at the time – probably thought the song a Björk tune when I heard it (not without good reason to, more on which in a bit). I am, of course, talking about Summerbre- No, just kidding, it's Wednesday's Child, which is baffling to me because, according to Lord Discogs, there's almost no way I could have heard it so prominently. The album it came from, Love In The Time Of Science, had sprung half a dozen singles, not one of which was this particular tune. Yet, the gentle organ chords, orchestral swells, the lyrics in the chorus, the “ba-ba-ba ba, ba-ba-ba baaa” bridge... I know I've heard it before, and frequently, as though it was a minor radio hit back in the day. How? Where? Why??

Emiliana Torrini had released a few albums in her native Iceland prior to Love In The Time Of Science, plus provided vocals for GusGus, but for all intents this was her debut to a wider audience. Being that she hailed from the same country as Björk, and was signed to the same label as Björk, One Little Indian, it's not surprising that this album feels like her producers were trying to mould Ms. Torrini into a similar star. Especially as Björk had grown a tad too esoteric for pop radio by decade's end. Don't worry, folks, here's another Icelandic chanteuse doing singer-songwriter trip-hop! Not sure those were shoes Emiliana was eager to wear, especially as her following body of work generally steered further way from the trip-hop as heard here. Plenty of guest features and writing credits in that wake though.

The '90s certainly drip in Love In The Name Of Science, if that's any way to describe an album of singer-songwriter trip-hop. It sometimes comes off a little over-produced for the simple, intimate nature of the lyrics, though I never feel Emiliana is overshadowed by the orchestral flourishes or wall-of-sound rhythms. The gritty, chaotic guitar squall of Telepathy wouldn't hurt with a Tricky guest verse either. And yes, Summerbreeze does provide an acoustic outing for the whole album, like a gentle closing credits sequence to all that came before. Would be good for future consideration in soundtracks, especially if Björk isn't available.

Various - Hed Kandi World Series: Miami

Hed Kandi: 2011

Someone must have told the Hed Kandi offices they done fucked up on the London volume of World Series, because is this ever an improvement. It's still not great, mind you, but Miami at least feels like a Hed Kandi release, unlike the generic, soulless Ministry Of Sound bandwagon jump London was. Even a glance at the tracklist shows the music steering back to the tried, tested and true vibes of days gone by. Wally Lopez! Olav Basoski! The Shapeshifters! Funkagenda! StoneBridge! Like, seriously, StoneBridge is one of the stalwarts of Hed Kandi, always getting repped in their compilations, and London had him not. That alone proves how full of fail those CDs were (no offence to Avicii, but c'mon).

All hyperbole aside, I should bring y'all up to speed on what the World Series was all about. Far as I can tell, it was Ministry Of Sound Hed Kandi's attempt at a Global Underground styled globe-trotting DJ mix series, though focusing on top-tier fashion locales as well as clubbing hot spots. Not an entirely daft idea for a series, and the Hed Kandi of old certainly branded itself as something of a trendy taste-maker within that particular scene.

Thus the inlays are filled with spiffy write-ups about hot clubs, cool restaurants, and must-visit boutique shops (why yes, Ministry Of Sound was the first club mentioned in the London inlay, why do you ask?). Again, not a bad idea for extra promotional branding, but it seems the series wasn't long for the world (arf), folding shortly after this volume. Interestingly, Miami is the only locale with a sequel. Just can't beat those Latin jams, eh? Or those WMC perks.

To be critically honest though, both discs are filled with big builds and anthems and all that rot I bitched about in the London mixes (different local DJs handle each disc, but their styles are so similar, it's a moot point who they are). The difference is how they deliver though, how many of the peaks actually thrust forward with enthusiasm, not drop into a plodding anti-anthem. Oh, this build lasts over a minute? Don't matter, 'cause that peak with the bellowing diva is gonna' have you flailing like a junglist! Okay, maybe not that enthusiastically, but more than whatever those dopes on ketamine are up to.

Granted, it's not all forward-momentum goodness all the time. There are stretches where the builds are too gratuitous or don't deliver what they promise or don't serve any purpose other than having a build for build's sake because you gotta' have a build in every single track in a Ministry Of Sound mandated release. In a way though, it almost works, the lesser builds highlighting how good the great builds are. Plus, the fact it all sounds like Hed Kandi music (except that one McProg track, wha'da'fuq?), shameless and shallow but disco-y and fun, that's good too. Look, after the abysmal showing in the previous World Series collection, I'll take it.

Various - Hed Kandi World Series: London

Hed Kandi: 2010

I've heard the tales of Hed Kandi's turn toward shameless bandwagon chasing so often repeated that I couldn't help but repeat them myself. Surely the folks that were following the label since its inception would be knowledgeable in those matters, such that I could trust their opinions on it. Still, always that lingering doubt in my head, wondering if it was a classic case of a fandom growing jaded as their favoured thing drifts from that which they so initially enjoyed. I know I've been guilty of such notions, and while the Hed Kandi brand wasn't a super-underground franchise, it did carve out a particular niche in the clubbing consciousness by adhering to a certain aesthetic that appealed to a certain demographic: classy, funky, soulful disco and house for those who liked classy, funky, soulful disco and house.

So I can imagine with great sympathy the pain and sense of betrayal the Hed Kandi faithful felt upon hearing a triple-CD outing such as this. Like, I get why the label would take such a turn, the allure of big festival fuck-off money too tempting to resist. And sure, Timothy Berg had hit upon a successful formula that was super-easy to copy and paste for others to capitalize on, such that you could whip up your own Avicii clones to fill out a CD or three. That was never really Hed Kandi's M.O. though, was it? Yeah, their brand of disco house was commercial at times, something you'd hear in boutique clothing stores at the mall. Never the main mall speakers though.

CD 1 of World Series: London is all anthem house (re: 'big room EDM'), all the way through. And while Avicii only appears a few times in this set, his impact can be felt throughout. It's utterly banal and tiring and the sort of stop-start nonsense you'd have expected from the eurotrance scene. Nope, this is now what house music also is, and what Hed Kandi's pushing, so fuck all those who held the label with any sort of regard for class. Funk and soul is dead.

“Hey, now, Bitter Boy, that's just CD 1, the clubbing fodder used to lure impulse buyers in,” some may claim. “CD 2 is where the real tunes are, right?” Sure, if you fancy yourself anthemic 'deep' house – a bunch of big builds, but crashing out into monotonous tech-house anti-grooves. You can hear flashes of Hed Kandi of old, little pieces of singing soul sista's and booty-shakin' rhythms, but come off like teasing nostalgia triggers to remind you of what once was, but no longer is.

Honestly, were it not for the unmixed third CD, with awesome names like Tiga, Peaches, Röyksopp, and Silicone Soul included, World Series: London would have been a total write-off for yours truly. This was the sort of music that caused my 'crisis of faith' back in 2010 (among others), and I wasn't even a Hed Kandi follower then! Those poor, unfortunate souls...

The Winterhouse - Winter Gardens

dataObscura: 2012

I assume my fascination with winter's clime' stems from the fact I live in a region that doesn't experience winter in the 'traditional' sense. Sure, we get snow once or thrice a season, but to be perpetually blanketed in a white layer of quieting frozen water is incredibly rare. Thus, when constantly bombarded with romantic imagery of such seasonal situations, it makes one fonder for that which we need not deal with. Maybe I need to go snow-shoeing around the local ski hills to get it out of my system.

When ambient music tackles wintery aesthetics, it's often as bleak and desolate drone. Sometimes we'll get shimmery, crystalline moments, but as brief respites of glistening beauty among the suffocating, icy gloom. It's uncommon finding albums that explore frigid environments as someplace mysterious and magical; a 'wonderland', if you may. Or there's a huge sub-sub genre-market for it out there, and I'm wandering the wrong wastelands. The artists are probably all Japanese too.

Anyhow, this is a roundabout way of me justifying my purchase of Winter Gardens from The Winterhouse. Something evocative about that cover art, y'know, luring me in into a tranquil, hibernating forest, exploring nooks and crannies sheltering small, sleeping mammals. As I say, perfect settings to indulge a little snow-shoeing, but a suitable soundtrack for such an endeavor?

The Winterhouse is a collaborative project from Anthony Kerby and Robert Davies. The former I've talked up plenty now, since diving into dataObscura meant diving into a lot of his musical output. Mr. Davies I haven't touched upon yet, though his story isn't much different from Mr. Kerby's: some two dozen albums, mostly all released on dataObscura as well, with Winterhouse being his lone outside project. So, does that make him the Solar Fields to Kerby's Aes Dana, with Winterhouse being dataObscura's H.U.V.A. Project? Doubtful, but it's a fun notion nonetheless.

While I wasn't expecting some cheery, chipper, New Age outing with Winter Gardens, I was expecting a little less of the pure drone that I've heard from dataObscura thus far. 'Tis not to be, this one just as layered and minimalist as most of the music I've heard from Kerby and co'. Which isn't such a bad thing if I'm in the mood for moody pad work and sparse melodic movements. I dunno' tho', seeing so much stark white in the cover had me thinking Winter Gardens would be a bit... brighter. Silly me, overlooking the greyscale forest from the shadowy trees.

Winter Hymn does provide a pleasant, tranquil opener, but the foreboding tones of dark ambient are quick to make their presence felt in follow-up The Depths Of Winter. The murky mood mostly permeates the rest of the album, with We Walk Through Glass offering some of those shimmering, glistening sounds I alluded to albums of this nature so often containing. Feel Winter Gardens could have used more moments like that. Isn't a garden supposed to highlight the beauty of nature, not the suppression of it?

Spielerei & Mantacoup - Wichman And Other Pieces

Databloem: 2004

I started this current, nigh-endless alphabetical backlog on a Spielerei & Mantacoup release. Seems appropriate that, as I come to its end, I finish with a Spielerei & Mantacoup release. Not quite the end, mind, still a couple more items below here, but man, what a journey it's been, eh? I reviewed Cold War all the way back in, gosh, March? And here we are, around one hundred reviews later, not to mention multiple weeks of vacation thrown in (plus, um, other 'stuff'). All acceptable factors in taking as long as I have in getting through it, but man, it sure felt a slog at some points. Just a tad too much of the noodly, droning ambient, methinks.

What's even funnier about (nearly) ending this run on this particular album is its place in the Spielerei & Mantacoup discography, as this was the first one they released together. Keep in mind that Cold War was their last collaborative work, and was the first CD I reviewed in this stretch. Never would I have thought the sequencing in this project of mine would contain an actual ouroboros; at least, not until I reach Model 500's Classics again.

Wichman And Other Pieces may be the first album these two released together, though they each had some work out on dataObscura in that time too. So the two crossed paths, vibed on the synergy, and made some music – not an uncommon occurrence in the going-ons of musicians. What makes this particular CD so funny-weird is the fact it's mostly a live album. Yes, their 'debut' release mostly includes recordings taken from The Wichman Concert, which is a rather ballsy move on Databloem's part. The young label hadn't even reached it's tenth release yet, but hey, here's a live session from a couple artists making their debut on our print. I joke, but truthfully, Databloem had been releasing a few of these 'Databloem In Concert' CDs already, including one from Saul Stokes, plus another due from The Circular Ruins (because of course).

For the purposes of this CD, The Wichman Concert is divided up into seven parts, though it is a continuous long-play with various movements and sections throughout. So lots of segments of synth drone, pad washes, burbly electronics, and soft, dubby ambient techno rhythms. Part 4 gets surprisingly aggressive, its chugging, groovy beats sounding like they're being dragged through dub-mud, while Part 7 provides the requisite uptempo closure to a live set (paging Dr. Jarre on that one), though nothing that'll have folks rioting in their zoot suits.

As the album title implies, there wasn't enough material in the concert for a full-fledged album, so four additional pieces are added. These mostly follow upon the same moody, dubby ambient techno vibes as the live stuff, while Sfunato treads startlingly close to the domain of psy-dub. It's all quite good and all, though really mostly just confirms Databloem a class label throughout its lifespan than anything on the artists' part.

Harold Budd - The White Arcades

Opal Records/All Saints: 1988/2018

I've noticed some folks pointing to this particular album as the point Harold Budd broke out from being thought of as just 'that guy who provides piano on Brian Eno's ambient', which is funny since Brian Eno produced this album. I get where they're coming from though, Harold's most prominent records prior to this still his Eno collaborations (Ambient 2: The Plateaux Of Mirrors and The Pearl). He'd released at least a half-dozen other LPs in that time, but remained rather obscure compared to those – forced to basically self-release some of them didn't help Budd's efforts in getting noticed outside Eno's shadow.

Still, Harold found other musicians to work with throughout his budding '80s career, including the folks over in the Cocteau Twins camp. He even made an album with them, The Moon And The Melodies, though for some reason, it wasn't credited as an album with the Cocteau Twins. Rather, each member of the band was credited separately, as though they were musicians on par with Harold Budd in this particular recording session. Odd, is all I'm saying, though it did give Mr. Budd access to their studio for future projects, plus a little extra bump of prestige beyond the ambient art world.

The effects of that collaboration could definitely be felt in Lovely Thunder, released the same year as The Moon And The Melody, and might have even been included in this Budd Box, if it had been out on a different label. But nay, the purpose of this set was to round up Harold's albums on minor prints, from which the follow-up to that was The White Arcades, released on Opal Records. In fact, it was among the print's launching releases, established by, of course, Brian Eno. Well, something had to take the place of the defunct Editions EG. Again, it just seems odd seeing folks pointing here as Harold's major turning point outside Eno's influence with so much of Brian's hand still in the pot.

What I think is meant is that The White Arcades is a handy summation of what Budd was doing throughout the '80s, a nice capper on a decade's worth of music making. For sure it's got the gentle piano tones about, but moody, atmospheric pad work with modern classical flourishes too. Yeah, we're still in the era when ambient was still mostly abstract art music, so you wouldn't imagine this stuff being out of place in museum galleries or the like, but it's also quite nice and soothing and relaxing to hear too. We're still a year or two off from when the scene would take a sharp turn towards the ravey-psychedelic stuff.

The White Arcades might be among Harold Budd's best solo albums of the '80s, but as I've already talked about so many of his albums from that period, I'm not left with much else to say than that. You should know what to expect from a Budd joint by now, and this record delivers it wonderfully.

Hexstatic - When Robots Go Bad!

Ninja Tune: 2007

When stacked against commercial success, Hexstatic might be one of Ninja Tune's most successful, though almost entirely due to their breakout single. Which was a collaboration with Coldcut. Of course, I'm talking about Timber, and whether it was Hexstatic or Coldcut that actually had more to do with the single, it remains one of the label's most famous hits, one that would be difficult to follow upon. Not that Coldcut had much need to, their legacy in dance music's history firmly entrenched. Hexstatic though, they may have had some pressure in creating another chart topper, lest they be thought of just a flash in the pan wonder. Would explain the bandwagon jumping on When Robots Go Bad!

Or maybe I'm thinking too much into this. Hexstatic did spend their initial album efforts doing quirky cut-up electro and traditional Ninja-hop (including a supremely cheekily titled track called Ninja Tune - it has chop-socky samples). When listening to this LP though, with half the tunes such blatant cross-over attempts compared to their past discography, I can't help but make such assumptions. Like, I know 'electro' was big and all in the mid-'00s, but they didn't have to go this far and obvious with it, did they? Surely Coldcut's failed 'pop' singles from Sound Mirrors should have clued them in this wasn't a lane Ninja Tune could easily adapt to?

The best way I can describe When Robots Go Bad! is it's an album I would have absolutely loathed in the year it came out, and probably have written a scathing, snarky, embarrassing review for TranceCritic on it. I was so done with trashy club fodder trying to pass itself as cool and hip that I'd basically deny whatever good tunes might come paired with it. It wasn't a very good stance to have on music, but eh, we're all rather immature in our opinions when we've yet to reach thirty, amirite?

I can't say tracks like Red Laser Beam, Freak Me, Prom Night Party, and Move On have aged well because you couldn't imagine them being made at any other time; the Ed Banger aesthetic was almost as prevalent as 'minimal' was. To say nothing of Bust, so desperately trying to be Boys Noize it hurts.

Fortunately, they're the most egregious examples of Hexstatic 'going bad', the rest of the album moving between classier stabs at mainstream electro (Tokyo Traffic), and right-proper electro jams. Man, if only the whole CD had been like the smashing Newton's Cradle, or smooth-cruisin' Newwaves and TLC (that one's almost atmospheric jungle). Meanwhile, tunes like Roll Over and A Different Place provide enough soul-sista' finesse for the requisite vocal needs, if Hexstatic were so insistent on having them.

So an album with some good, some bad, some middling, and a rather odd entry into the Ninja Tune catalogue. Can't say the Ninja faithful would have been pleased with it, but I imagine they were more interested in new Amon Tobin or Cinematic Orchestra that year anyway.