There are words on the way regarding Hyperdub’s immense 5 year collection, but they’ve also been dropping a few tasty singles of recent, not least Ikonika’s latest 12” ‘Sahara Michael/ Fish’ straight off the back of last months equally opulent ‘Smuck’ (on Planet Mu). Bringing a female touch to the dubstep/funky/wonky sound going around at the moment, it’s a joyous low key 8-bit synth affair. The soundtrack to some remorseful computer mourning reminiscent of the times when the music Nintendo was cranking out on their games was better than 2D platforms they were backing; full of warm enveloping tones, a nice 2-step beat, with a little higher pitched G/P-funk synth taking the lead. B-side ‘Fish’ ups the tempo and the layers, a more percussive exploration with the necessary dash of bass, to accompany the future-retro synths and banging woodblock. All in all, sumptuous stuff, putting Ikonika and fellow Hyperdubber Darkstar, at the forefront of this funk and synth led development.
JOY ORBISON: ‘BRKLN CLLN’
It’s fair to say a lot of critics and clubbers shit their pants when the first heard Joy Orbison’s debut ‘Hyph Mngo’ drop earlier in the year – you know it’s a classic when it pinnacle is one note – but he has followed it up on his own imprint, DOLDRUMS, with ‘BRKLN CLLN’ backed with ‘J.Doe’. It essentially applies the same principles, vocal cut up sits on top of swelling bass, but with a more forceful rhythm (check the twisted processed sound sitting in the place of a straight handclap), encapsulating something morose with some skewed euphoria in there. The synth/keyboard chord may be processed to the point of an object of beauty, but this (naturally) doesn’t quite scale the heights of ‘Hyph Mngo’.
I feel a palpable sense of disappointment at the output of the stars of electronica as they were (in what I will refer to as simpler times for no apparent reason) in their post-Warp-heyday era, but perhaps this is just because LFO, Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, Autechre et al propelled themselves so far ahead of everything else surrounding them, sonically as well as simply in terms of concept and enterprise, that there was nowhere left to go. For a brief moment, electronica seemed so futuristic, so innovative and at times plain mind blowing (a much overused term I know, but really, think about the first time you heard Aphex/Autechre/Squarepusher) that it never really occurred to me that those same artists would, well, plateau (to be polite), satisfied to fall back into the cult they loved and receive a little less exposure delivering acid sets and producing music for their friends alone. All have maintained a consistency, a continuation of ideas, but really never moved into the places we dreamt they might push us.
Richard James may have been the poster boy, but Luke Vibert was as much part of this scene as anyone, perhaps suffering only from not having an identity quite as distinct as the members of the Warp stable; his forays into the Ninja Tune/Mo Wax brand of dance and hip hop, his love of all things acid, making him a jack of all trades rather than a master of anything specific. Through his various projects (Wagon Christ, Plug etc) he has undoubtedly produced a few classic tunes (‘Receiver’ from his Ninja Tune days and ‘I Love Acid’ come straight to mind as particularly memorable singles), but also suffers from an inconsistency that has left him without the recognition he perhaps deserves as a producer (and he is, incidentally, as good a DJ as I have seen; there‘s something immensely satisfying about dancing to quelching, bastardised electro for 30 minutes until ‘Take On Me’ emerges for a brief moment of clarity before the musical perversion recommences).
With this in mind his new record for Planet mu, We Hear You, fails to dispel the doubts, instead simultaneously enforcing the view of an artist too eclectic and inconsistent to produce an album that will become as memorable as Richard D James (or one of the ‘trip hop’ classics), and one that is criminally underappreciated, with more vitality and spark than many of his contemporaries. We Hear You also serves as a reminder that Vibert was as influenced by hip hop as anything else, and perhaps this is what sets him apart, and gives him an outlook of his own. Read the rest of this entry »
