Listening to the beginning tracks on DJ Ray Velasquez’s Samba Sunset, you’d think that only one type of chord (major seventh) and one type of beat (straight-ahead samba) were available to lounge musicians. Like the best elevator music, Calm’s “Sitting on the Beach” and Fantastic Plastic Machine’s “Whistle Song” are seductively linear, and the feelings they elicit are akin to watching porn with beautiful actors and no edge: delightful boredom. Fortunately, Soulstance’s paean to Antonio Carlos and Louie Vega’s “Mozalounge” stretch the genre by incorporating piano cadenzas and organ licks that are worth committing to memory.
Various Artists Bobby & Steve:Past, Present & Future-A 20th Anniversary
House and disco won’t take your mind in all sorts of funky directions, no matter what opiate you took before entering the club. But if your approach to music is more along the lines of “Move your ass, and your mind will follow,” then you’ll love the wonderfully escapist sounds of Bobby & Steve. Seamless mixing and sequencing, whimsical breaks and a selection of tunes that put a positive spin on romance (what disco fan wouldn’t melt listening to the infectious voices of Phylis Hyman and Rene & Angela?) make Past, Present & Future an unexpectedly stunning album.
Mr. Projectile Sinking
David Toop has spoken of “nostalgia for the future,” and this is it. Mr. Projectile’s Sinking contains music honed and plied with incredible focus, cured and steeped with painstaking care. It doesn’t follow the maniacal minimalism that currently holds the hangers on. It has soul, without mimicking it; it has history, without aping it. The tones and textures of this album are incredible in their delicacy and wisdom. It plumbs the depths of percussion and comes up with polished and well-hewn bass, big enough for the best wall of sound. Often, Sinking‘s mix of broken IDM sounds, mutated breakbeats, and luxuriant cadences defies categorization, so don’t try too hard to fit this into one genre. Just know that it’s huge, meaningful and smart…and stunningly beautiful.
Sizzla Jah Knows Best
Sizzla, the hardline dancehall Rastafarian, scores another rootsy revival with this, his third (!) album of 2004. Keeping a pace of nearly four to five full LPs a year could drive even the most fervent fan broke, but the skillet keeps cooking, and it only looks to be heating up. Diehard fans will applaud, but the production on Jah Knows Best is canned in parts, leaving some of the most potent lines wobbling on their own. Nonetheless, Sizzla’s conscientious meanderings are lyrical nourishment for anyone who thinks dancehall relies too little on verbal substance. Still, beats are important, and it’s a shame these poetics are paired with utterly predictable reggae rhythms.
Sex In Dallas Berlin Rocks Parts 1 & 2
Kitty Yo is certainly milking this track for all it’s worth, this being the second and third 12″ of remixes. But the cream that comes off it gets whipped in the form of stripped-down interpretations, the best of them courtesy of Boris of Berlin, Sammy Dee and Stewart Walker with Moroder dub rock, chilled microhouse and mysterious minimalism respectively.
Lucky Pierre Total Horizontal
Wherein our favorite Arab Strap-per gives forth a white light whir of strummed harps and French horns. One version comes with beats, the other sans. A wonderful little pocket symphony.
Echopilot (Brain Aneurysm) Deeper Function EP
Like Drexciya and Thomas Fehlmann having at it, Echopilot gives us his version of new school vintage. The results are enticing. Smart and loose, the Pilot presents us with the best thing Morris Audio has done yet. No small feat, mind you.
New Days New Days
From London’s sophisticated Sud comes an excellent plate of gurgling, shuffling microhouse from a sharply chosen international quartet: Portable, Akiko Kiyama, Milos and Lump. It’s all digital icebox rhythms Mille Plateaux would cream over, and you’ll love riding them over and over. I certainly do.
Radian Juxtaposition
Austerity is a stereotype that Germanic avant-gardists have earned over the years, and the new album from Viennese trio Radian may not radically alter this perception. But in comparison with their debut, Rec.Extern, Juxtaposition is downright merry. There’s still plenty in the way of digitally composed space-that is, room between sounds, empty industrial wastelands-but where Rec.Extern processed the trio’s improvisations into digital oblivion, Juxtaposition leaves trace elements of live rhythms and hints that this is in fact a trio that plays music. Fans of Kammerflimmer Kollectif and To Rococo Rot, take note.
8 Track Stereo Guide To Nerd Sounds
From Bed-Stuy comes a very nice off-kilter sampler under the guise of Nerd Sounds. But these tracks defy the bedroom tag, ranging from the blissed-out ambience of Shakeyface to the heavy illbient darkcore of Damn You Suzuki to the slumber dub of Carlito Verde and finally the tense string-hp of Run TNT.
