Category Archives: Switched On

Switched On – JVXTA: Euston Blues (Scissor and Thread)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

JVXTA is presented as a relatively anonymous DJ project – but it turns out to be the London-based DJ Charles Field, who runs his own label Hardmatter. This release, slightly confusingly, references a London area in the title but is released on Brooklyn-based imprint Scissor and Thread. Field wanted it to work across a number of genres, utilising elements of deeper and classic house, improvisation and experimentation – all with an ambient finish.

What’s the music like?

Euston Blues has a very satisfying ebb and flow, down and up. We start in relative stillness, with the murky textures of No One Needs To Know, which blossoms into the classic deep house of Hold On, equal parts Detroit and Chicago in style but with a piano profile that takes on an improvised life of its own.

Water Temple goes deep too, before reaching for the stars with richly voiced keyboards – after which a nocturnal piano solo takes over. The city mood continues as a saxophone leads Lost In Place, another classy house number, and then to Beyond, which has the thick ambience of a city at night. The Stolen Child adds a strong sense of mystery, piano and flute duelling in the heights, before the closing title track, a broadly conceived nocturnal sketch of eleven minutes. It ends the album in softer ambience, though a busy drum track gives it energy three minutes in.

Does it all work?

Most of the time. A lot of Euston Blues is mood music, meaning it doesn’t always hold melodic interest, but it is never less than descriptive.

Is it recommended?

It is. Subtle on the surface but giving more reward to closer listening, this is a deep and evocative piece of work from a talented producer.

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Switched On – Qwalia: Sound & Reason (Alberts Favourites)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Qwalia are a quartet making music in the most instinctive way possible. The four musicians have illustrious connections – headed by drummer Yusuf Ahmed, they also include Tal Janes (guitar and vocals), Ben Reed (bass) and Joseph Costi (keyboard), All have plenty of experience with ‘featured’ artists such as Frank Ocean, Jordan Rakei, Orlando Weeks and Hayden Thorpe – but this project represents a healthy artistic freedom dating back to the pandemic.

Setting up in a studio for two days in April 2021, they made recordings of pure improvisation, since distilled into an album of seven tracks.

What’s the music like?

The drum tracks do dictate the outcome on this album, but in a wholly musical way. Listen to The Trip, a fine opener whose percussion track is complemented by plush synth line – or the title track, which has an easy, low slung groove and good vocals. Meanwhile Electric Highway has a slightly staggered gait, whereas Haven’t You Heard is spacious, syncopated and with a chance for the keyboards to wig out. The initially woozy Waghera actually has animated vocals, while In Your Own Words becomes a thoughtful piano contemplation over thoughtful drums.

Fool Me Once is one of the best moments, a first track that has a catchy line but opens out nicely, with spacey keyboards

Does it all work?

Yes – the instinctive approach reaps dividends, and the music bursts with ideas. The drum lead from Ahmed is very strong, too.

Is it recommended?

Yes. Jazz and funk bases are safely covered, with a healthy amount of experimentation too.

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Switched On – John Atkinson: Energy Fields (AKP Recordings)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Energy Fields is the response of composer John Atkinson to climate change. Over four tracks it presents field recordings from September 2019 at the Ucross Foundation in Wyoming.

Atkinson’s Bandcamp page describes ‘the largest coal-producing state in America, as well as a burgeoning hub for renewables and carbon capture. These sounds of electrical hums, shuddering coal mines, roaring refineries, and gently clanking wind turbines, along with groaning bison, chattering cranes, and other wildlife, are reshaped into four tracks of heavy drone that veer from anxiety to awe, and from anthropocentric to transcendent.’

What’s the music like?

At times, a riot of colour and activity – at other times reaching a zen level of calm. Spiritual Electricity switches on for a particularly bright opening, with sustained pitches and drones. It conjures up visions of dragonflies as the current passes through, before giving the impression of a radio drifting in and out of focus. Black Thunder has a darker, fragmented outlook, the same electronic fuzz now sounding sinister as it lurks in wait to quash any melodic cells.

By contrast Casper brings a lovely purity to its bright treble pitches, while World Wind is more obviously industrial in its outlook, but the workings are strangely comforting over a held drone and with hints of birdsong in the background. As a consonant harmony makes itself ever clearer, Atkinson’s music takes on a refreshing purity – and we are left with the chatter of the birds.

Does it all work?

Yes – in a very unhurried way, creating some vivid portraits of the Wyoming location. For immersive listening it is hard to rival.

Is it recommended?

It is. Escapism is an all-too common requirement in the music we consume these days, but John Atkinson ensures the trip is a deep and meaningful one.

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Switched On – Neil Cowley: Battery Life (Mote)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Battery Life is a wholly appropriate title for Neil Cowley’s second solo album. It reflects his experience of bittersweet memories – ‘like a battery, they come with a positive and a negative’, he says. Cowley will reveal all in a forthcoming interview with Arcana, but here he plays out the memories through his piano. He uses a slightly modified instrument, with dampeners often applied for more sensitive volume control, while the main melodic material is dressed with complementary electronics and percussion. These materials draw from ambient and semi-classical sources, though Cowley retains an approach that allows for free improvisation.

What’s the music like?

Intimate and often moving. Cowley avoids by some distance the trappings of arpeggiated piano music, staying well away from the café or the hotel bar and drawing the listener in to the front room or the studio.

In fact the feeling grows that as listeners we are sat right next to Cowley at the piano and able to read his thoughts as he plays. Often he will begin with musical fragments that then blossom into meaningful phrases or riffs on which other thoughts can build, often with percussion and ambient brush strokes for company.

Automata is a good example of Cowley’s careful production of the piano sound itself, employing dampeners and giving effective electronic displacements to the sound. Breaka combines short motifs and windswept atmospherics with a slow but solid rhythm, while more detached figures probe and build up momentum on Ticker Tape.

While a good deal of the tone is serious that does not stop more capricious thoughts, such as those on Scarab Beetle, where little hooks blossom into full blown flights of fancy. The closing Cord brings emotions to a height, still restrained yet deeply meaningful.

Does it all work?

It does. The thoughtful approach is an ideal base from which to work, but through the different tracks Cowley is able to apply instinct, humour and the bittersweet nostalgia that comes with memory recall. The use of perspective through the electronics and ambient effects is subtly applied but gives the music extra layers too.

Is it recommended?

Very much so – a fine and lasting sequel to Hall Of Mirrors, and an album that shows Neil Cowley to be an emotive artist whose fingers have plenty to say.

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Let’s Dance – Alexander Robotnick: Kind Of Disco: Simple Music Vol. 2 (Hot Elephant Music)

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by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Alexander Robotnick doesn’t do anything by halves. The Italian producer – real name Maurizio Dami – has been making disco or disco / house hybrids with great success for more than 30 years now, so it comes as little surprise to report that a second volume of Simple Music follows hot on the heels of the first, at a distance of just three months.

Simple Music refers to the sort of music Robotnick wants to hear when he goes digging for records, and finds him delivering eight new tracks for the dancefloor.

What’s the music like?

Classy. Robotnick is a past master at this sort of stuff, and the music here achieves its aim with the minimum of fuss. Green Past is a great way to start, a bit of mood music with an atmospheric, repeated vocal that would work just as well with opening credits as it does at the start of a disco album. Robotnick knits the melodies together with ease. And Here It Comes Again is a strong Italo-disco cut, and moody with it.

Intergalactic Travel is a brilliant 80s-present day hybrid, with a suitably deadpan vocal and complementary riffs underpinned by a strong beat. Though it is pure escapism the track is actually discounting the possibility of reaching new worlds! Arpico is similarly effective, its oscillating riff bathed in warm textures.

The World Is Dark, proclaims a whispered voice, while its counterpart suggests ‘the world is shiny’. Rippling synthesizers respond, and a bass that glints in the darkness – again a highly effective track. A Blow To The Heart is a burst of nostalgia – ‘listen to your early mixes’, it warns over a squelchy bass. Canzon Triste introduces hints of melancholy, a more minimal and less effective track, but Le Carillon sweeps that away with a riff that bounces around like a game of ping pong, set to a strong rhythm.

Does it all work?

It does. Robotnick knows exactly what he is doing, and the hand of experience delivers eight consistently good tracks primed for the discerning dancefloor.

Is it recommended?

It is – and it’s as good as the first volume.

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You can listen to clips and purchase at the Juno download website