Category Archives: Switched On

Switched On – Marc Romboy Presents: Music from Space (Dimension A) (Systematic)

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space_dimension_a

reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Marc Romboy’s Systematic imprint returns with a compilation inspired by his Music from Space radio show. With nine tracks stretching for just over an hour, this is an unmixed selection drawing on familiar names but also looking at some of the talent Romboy has discovered in the course of his show.

What’s the music like?

There is some very fine house music here. Petar Dundov contributes the suitably stellar Andante, a beautifully paced and structured piece of spatial electronica that gets all the right elements of feet and head stimulated.. The Oliver Linge & Olaf Pozsgay collaboration Neutron has a nice, chunky beat, while Romboy’s collaboration with Oniris, Eternity, is a spaced-out beauty that works in some satisfyingly solid breakbeats. Julian Wassermann’s The Red Planet might be minimal but still fires the imagination over some increasingly caustic synths.

Of the newer talent, Pôngo starts minimal but soon sprinkles synthesized stardust all over Blind, while MOLØ’s Fleut is an airy, blissed out experience. The equally promising Rodriguez Jr. works in a dubby profile underneath Mare Serenitatis.

Does it all work?

It does. The music might not be mixed, but Romboy’s instincts as a DJ serve him in good stead here, and the quality threshold is high throughout.

Is it recommended?

It is – anyone following Romboy’s releases as a producer or DJ will find much to enjoy here.

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Switched On – Matthew Herbert: Musca (Accidental)

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reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

With more than 25 years’ worth of experience in making house music, Matthew Herbert knows more than most how to make people dance. He has done so in a wide variety of ways, none more so than in his so-called ‘domestic’ albums Around The House and Bodily Functions – where the music was made from home appliances and the human body respectively.

Musca completes a trilogy of these albums, as far as the production goes – with added vocals from eight singers who Herbert had not met at the time of recording. It is, in effect, the ultimate lockdown album.

What’s the music like?

If you liked Herbert’s 1990s deep house, with its experimental tendencies and intimate language, you’ll love this. To get his musical sounds the composer manipulated a number of sounds from around the farm where he lives – so there are cameos from the pigs, dogs and foxes to name just a few. This being Herbert the sounds are expertly treated and fashioned into the language of house music, which on this occasion is a soulful model, especially with some of the vocalists involved.

Bianca Rose stands out for her contributions to Chain Reaction, Gold Dust and Let Me Sleep. The first of these has a lovely choral effect that Herbert secures as part of his word painting, while the last is a dreamy, piano-led nocturnal number with a wide sonic scope. Verushka is another to stand out on Fantasy, which has a clunking beat reminiscent of mid-90s Herbert and a sublime vocal.

Allie Armstrong is also an ideal foil for Herbert’s music, with the sombre but curiously moving The Horror a standout among her three contributions, its lyrics especially moving. The Impossible, meanwhile, has the backdrop of what sounds like a dripping tap in a barn, but the multi-tracked vocals are like a warm blanket in the coda.

Meanwhile Hypnotised, with Mel Uye-Parker, works really well thanks to deep keyboards and lovely layered vocals to dive into. It comes off the back of the treated vocals of Joy Morgan in Two Doors, with shuffling beats the backdrop to quite an eerie experience.

Only one of the 14 tracks is instrumental, The Slip positioned in the centre of the album and taking a jazzier profile, with flute solo and plucked bass.

Does it all work?

It does, largely. Part of this will depend on your approach to Herbert, for if you started listening to him because of his house music ventures you will definitely warm to this. It has an urban and soulful charm, with its beautifully layered textures, and its songs are constantly shifting, never too repetitive.

Is it recommended?

Very much so – for Musca is an album that is at turns relaxing, hypnotic, moving and subtly inspiring. Herbert’s command of the beats ensures there is never a moment wasted.

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Switched On – Connecting The Dots mixed by Alex Paterson (Kompakt)

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reviewed by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

In a little less than a year, Kompakt’s Connecting The Dots series has proved remarkably popular, as the label explore their substantial catalogue of electronic music. Now Alex Paterson, original founding member of The Orb, steps up to mine the more ambient side of the warehouse, pulling 17 out of the 15,000 available recordings to make a mix that would fall naturally into Kompakt’s Pop Ambient division.

The mix has been out for a while digitally, but has found its way on to Arcana’s early morning playlist in the last few weeks!

What’s the music like?

Extremely restful, providing a blissful 90-minute time out when needed – but also rewarding the closer listener, who can follow Paterson’s thought patterns as the meditative mood grows.

The Orb lynchpin starts with big, loping beats from Mohn, Schwarzer Schwan imposing a subtly menacing mood on proceedings. It doesn’t last, for the expansive Milk from Klimek is on hand. This track has like a series of long, slow breaths, taking its sweet time as each repetition leads gradually to a bigger, thicker sound.

Regular beats arrive once more with Markus Guentner’s mix of label founder Michael Mayer, Pensum held in place by a lovely suspended chord that you can dive into completely. The Orb’s own mix of Because Before by Ulf Lohmann is next, with lush slowly moving chords like a warm weather system. This blissful mood holds through the Fresco & Pfeiffer remix of Christian Löffler’s Pigment to ex-Orb member Thomas Fehlmann, and Treatment.

Each of the tracks is a good four and half minutes long at least, the slowly shifting mix paced just right. As it progresses we hear from Simon Scott, who spaces out his musical thoughts beautifully in Für Betty, and Andrew Thomas, static but meditative in I Am Here Where Are You. The mix reaches its zenith, however, with the quarter-hour penultimate track from Klimek. Music To Fall Asleep is a thing of beauty, drifting into a slow trance with a spatially altered guitar, against a background of softly pitched white noise. The coda is The Orb’s own Glen Coe, a cotton-wool glow of positive ambience and spoken word.

Does it all work?

It does – and a sure sign of this on the first few listens was that I couldn’t be bothered to check my player to see what the tracks were, or if indeed at some points we had even changed track! Such is the vibe behind Paterson’s choices, mixing and presentation.

Is it recommended?

Without hesitation. Paterson has so much experience in making fully immersive ambient music, and he clearly knows the corners of the Kompakt catalogue where the best possible mindful examples can be found. The artists not mentioned above – such as Gas and Walls – are testament to that. Nothing more need be said – just go and listen!

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https://open.spotify.com/album/46L9tNr4y1nCwpwDkYIyIT?si=2MDlseB5SyKzFvQHf1ZmMw

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You can listen to clips from the mix and purchase from the Kompakt website

 

Guest mix – Room of Wires collide with Rednetic

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It is our great pleasure to welcome Room of Wires and their Rednetic label to the Arcana playlist section.

With their new EP Fever Switch out now, Room of Wires have shared with us a mix they did of their favourite artists on the label. This includes the duo’s own work, with one of the standout tracks from the EP, the shuffling Never Seen Before, blending into the powerful Silent Lines from their distinctive plague of people album released earlier this year, with the strong presence of industry amid the ambience.

The mix unfolds at a natural pace, with plenty of room to breathe – and settles after the dense mass of sound that begins the mix. Gradually the textures thin to reveal flickering electronic figures, and a steady beat asserts itself, from where the duo progress across an hour of excellent music. Later on the view pans out to the dub-infused electronica of Lachrylic, whose Tacet makes a strong impression, before the rich tones of Garden of Meditating Maqam Rast, by Lowriders Deluxe. Finally Room of Wires sign off themselves, with the expansive TouchToneOne, a sonic exploration prompted by steady beats.

Our thanks to Room of Wires for this special mix:

https://soundcloud.com/rednetic/room-of-wires-collide-with-rednetic/s-V2xD4fIyCDe?si=44eba37fb77c421ea8256ee9e7bfea5e

Switched On – GLOK: Pattern Recognition (Bytes)

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What’s the story?

There is a sense that Andy Bell was pleasantly surprised by the success of Dissident, his first album as GLOK. Until then it seemed he was happy to let the project simmer beneath the surface, but as soon as that first album made its presence felt it gave him the confidence to spread his wings and spend more time in the studio.

Pattern Recognition builds on that success, taking the building blocks of Krautrock-influenced instrumentals and running with them, adding more nuances and possibilities. That means several vocal tracks for the first time.

The Bandcamp guide to the album reveals that it ‘has a loose thread which takes in a week of life, from weekend to weekend, with each of the vinyl’s four sides capturing different mind states across that transition. Each side has a distinct feel that’s different to the last but inherently cohesive – much like the changes an individual goes through over 7 days.’

What’s the music like?

Pattern Recognition has a greater breadth of styles than Dissident did, and now it has the vocalists to add extra depth and variety. The guests are all excellent, especially punk poet Sinead O’Brien on Maintaining the Machine, where her words dovetail beautifully with the GLOK synths and loping beats. Entanglement, featuring Chloé ‘C.A.R.’ Raunet, is cut from similar cloth, with more guitar in the mix and a really full, solid wall of sound to back it up.

Shamon Cassette is a brooding presence on the nocturnal Process, which bubbles atmospherically, while his wife Shiarra’s voice works really well against the pulsing figures and fat bass of That Time Of Night.

If you are already familiar with the music of Dissident you will appreciate the broad scope of the brilliantly named album opener Dirty Hugs. On it Bell gives himself nearly 20 minutes to unpack a throbbing groove in thrall to Krautrock and containing a lot of good things, which unwind at a really satisfying pace. It serves as a form guide for the rest of the album, as Pattern Recognition is a very substantial piece of work.

Closer nods a bit more to the techno of Mr Fingers in its square beat and bass line, but in contrast Memorial Device has an improvised piano line drifting past. Kintsugi is lovely, with its wide open sounds, while the woozy Day Three cuts to Invocation, where Bell’s sonic blender works a treat as part of a monotone and hypnotic groove, spun out again to more than 15 minutes as a track the listener can really immerse themselves in.

Two edits of Dirty Hugs and Closer complete an attractive bonus package.

Does it all work?

Yes, making it two out of two for Bell. Pattern Recognition does everything you would want from a follow-up to Dissident, and even accusations of it being too long would be brought up short. There is ample evidence of just how much Bell is enjoying his electronic incarnation, and the well-chosen vocal guests are the icing on the cake.

Is it recommended?

Heartily – as long as you already have the first installment of Bell’s GLOK incarnation!

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