Tag Archives: Francis Harris

Switched On – Soela: Dark Portrait (Scissor & Thread)

Posted on by
Reply

by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Russian-born and Berlin-based, DJ and producer Soela (Elina Shorokhova) moves to Scissor & Thread for Dark Portrait, an album that represents her response to the impact of the war in Ukraine.

With previous releases for Kompakt, Dial and Shall Not Fade, Soela is well established as a producer on the darker side of electronica, utilising her background as a classical pianist. Over its nine tracks Dark Portrait brings in an impressive guestlist, a combination of instrumental and vocal.

What’s the music like?

Soela’s tracks are carefully thought out and subtly coloured, but carry profound meaning. The tone is set by Unsuitable, a quiet and thoughtful piece of music with inward looking vocals. Through The Windows is also quiet but Francis Harris and Philipp Priebe bring presence, the subtle night-time rhythms making themselves known. Module One’s guest slot, Drowning, adds atmospheric beats and smudges of sound, while Dark Portrait itself has a semi-trancey approach.

The music hovers between deep house, dub and trip hop – but February Is Not Going To Be Forever, featuring Lawrence, has more explicit movement. The most meaningful track is left until last. The Darkest Hour Before Sunrise goes deep, with an especially evocative portrait of that special time of the day, bringing a balance to the end of the album that offers a peaceful outcome.

Does it all work?

It does – though turning up the volume on headphones will help appreciate the more subtle moments Soela finds on the album.

Is it recommended?

It is. Carefully considered and deep, this is a serious but successful foray into the darker side of electronica.

For fans of… Henrik Schwarz, Efdemin, Dani Siciliano, Matthew Herbert

Listen & Buy

Published post no.2,358 – Sunday 10 November 2024

Let’s Dance – Frank & Tony: Ethos (Scissor and Thread)

Posted on by
Reply

by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

Ten years on from their last appearance on a long playing format together, DJs Francis Harris and Anthony Collins renew their partnership with this collection of deep house cuts.

The idea was that Frank & Tony would connect for one night only on an imaginary dancefloor, vowing, in the words of the label, “to make work together in the future; however, having exchanged no information, and with classic club kid garb obscuring any common identifying characteristics, they turn to the internet in hopes of reconnecting for a collaboration.”

Since their first album, You Go Girl, the duo have taken part in all manner of collaborations, many of them under the Scissor and Thread umbrella, though here they use their own contact book to bring in a number of fellow artists. These include Eliana Glass, DaRand Land, Lawrence and DJ Aakmael.

What’s the music like?

Classy. Ethos fits into the duo’s observation that deep house music has evolved a great  deal since 2014, but in many ways it has been a point of stability. There has always been a need for new music in the genre, but often artists have been able to keep the stylistic features while producing quality new work.

Such is the case here. A warm wave breaks over Olympia, whose solid beat supports a beguiling vocal from Eliana Gloss. This is a heat-soaked track, crackling with atmosphere – a trick repeated later on with Cecile, with just a bit more breeze from the hi-hat.

DaRand Land joins for Ethos, an airy number with an active bass, while DJ Aakmael’s sultry collaboration Drift operates on the slower side, its minimal material spreading easily across the sonic sky. Too Poor For Movies, Too Tired For Love is a thoughtful number with Lawrence, its introspective mood countered by active keyboards.

The duo use fuller beats for their own tracks, upping the pace for By The End They Will, which features one of those keyboard pad sounds you could dive into. From Life Ahead is more languid, while Continuity breaks the beat and adds an effective spoken word sample.

Does it all work?

It does. This is the sort of music that seems to come effortlessly to Frank & Tony, but which is surprisingly hard to reproduce!

Is it recommended?

It is. An album of thoughtful deep house that comfortably does its job in also telling the feet to get that bit closer to the dancefloor.

For fans of… Miguel Migs, Kevin Yost,

Listen & Buy

Published post no.2,129 – Tuesday 26 March 2024

Switched On – Methyl Ethel: Are You Haunted? (Future Classic)

Posted on by
Reply

methyl-ethel

written by Ben Hogwood

What’s the story?

The fourth album from Methyl Ethel sees a slight shift in direction. Announced in January, it sees the band break from the 4AD label to move to Future Classic, and it sees an elevation for Jake Webb to take a more prominent role of front man, not too dissimilar to Oli Alexander’s way of thinking with Years + Years.

Are You Being Haunted? looks to bring out more of the band’s electronic side, while returning to the studio where they made their first records. This is a significant nod to the passing of a dear friend who Webb recorded with at the time.

What’s the music like?

Smart, chic and extremely enjoyable. There are some excellent songs here, tightly packaged and produced with a knowing hand. Proof is especially good, its winning couplet “What can you see now?” dressed with sweeping strings. “My head is heavy, I’ve had awful dreams!” sings Webb. Something To Worry About is great power pop on a larger scale, strutting its stuff with a stately tread. Kids On Holiday is similarly inspired, with torch song lyrics and occasionally irregular rhythms.

Neon Cheap is if anything even better, making a lasting impression with its sharp couplets and catchy hooks. Matters zips along, showing the strength in depth of the album as it leads onto the epic Castigat Ridendo Mores, which has a wall of sound at the heart of its chorus. Finally In A Minute, Sublime, offers a questioning coda, by turns elegant and powerful.

Does it all work?

Yes – because the Methyl Ethel approach is an ‘all killer, no filler’ variety. The album is a compact design, clocking in at around 40 minutes, and packs plenty of incident and verve into that time.

Is it recommended?

Yes, enthusiastically. The new chapter looks set to be a fruitful one for Methyl Ethel, and with Are You Being Haunted? it is off to an auspicious start.

Stream

Buy

Switched On – Francis Harris: Thresholds (Scissor and Thread)

Posted on by
Reply

francis-harris

What’s the story?

Francis Harris has already delivered a brace of thoughtful electronic albums in Lelend (2012) and Minutes of Sleep (2014), where he has considered some of our slowest moving and abstract ‘virtualities’. The train of thought continued with two albums as half of the Aris Kindt duo, but now Harris turns back to a solo identity for Thresholds.

In it, he ‘aspires to sonic universality and the presentation of a fully formed psychoacoustical world’, though it is not an ‘album of ideas’. In the commentary from his label, ‘inspired by the ecological and political upheavals of the present and the role of speculative thought as an avenue of global transformation, Thresholds is the work of a mature artist fully in control of his powers’.

What’s the music like?

While it is certainly important to consider the elements above, Thresholds stands on its own two feet for the listener who is completely new to its thoughts and sound worlds.

Often these worlds cross over, the album acting as the sonic equivalent of being on a train journey, or standing still while observing an object pass against overhead against a starry backdrop. The most effective tool here is the wide range of percussion, some of it very subtle, that Harris has at his disposal. The instruments and sounds, both acoustic and electronic, decorate the slow awakening of Useless Machines, then pepper Rebstock Fold with what feels like spots of electronic rain as a slower moving sequence of chords takes hold.

Harris keeps a background haze to proceedings, while a variety of musical languages unfold in the foreground. Many of these are slow moving, honing in on certain details, such as the muffled trumpet solo or vocal snippets that feature in Earth Moves. The dappled colours created by the music are often softly mesmerising. The title track, for instance, has digital chattering in the foreground while chords shift slowly in the background. The trumpet reappears on Speculative Nature Of Purposive Form as part of a largely static soundscape, but Cut Up responds to this with a good deal of nervous energy, its percussive buzzing suggesting an outlying jazz influence.

Does it all work?

Yes. These thoughtful compositions are consistently engaging but work as a whole in shifting the focus of the mind to calmer areas, the listener taking in the musical activity around the stereo picture but able to let it run on its way simultaneously.

Is it recommended?

Yes – Francis Harris makes ambient music with a difference, its intricate construction creating all sorts of moving patterns that the listener can either latch on to or allow to run free. Its imaginative colours and textures reveal something different with each encounter.

Stream

Buy