Album Review: FabricLive 50 - dBridge & Instra:mental present Autonomic

dBridge & Instra:mental's Autonomic mix for FabricLive eschews expectations for a drum 'n' bass mix by slowing things down. Right down.

After collaborating on a track together, dBridge and Instra:mental collaborated to form Autonomatic - ultimately a club night with spin-offs, the most significant of which is, as the press release say, ultimately a style of music.

Because FabricLive 50 doesn't just slow things down. It is considerably slower than even a breakbeat set, with the tempo coming in below a chilled out 100bpm. This is still distinctively dnb though, and both dBridge (formerly part of the fairly legendary Bad Company) and Instra:mental clearly know their craft.

The album opener, Riva's 'Seems Like', glides a soulful vocal over a spacious backing that gently melds into Instra:mental's own 'From The Start' but as soulful as the whole thing feels the beats are deep, percussive and ultimately pure liquid drum 'n' bass.

But slow drum 'n' bass sounds about as much fun as stretching out the Queen's speech to last the whole of Christmas day, Boxing day and maybe even right up to New Year's Eve... Surely the point is that it gets you moving, the rolling basslines, pitched vocals, and the last thing we want is more bloody dubstep.

But as we said, dBridge and Instra:mental clearly know what they are doing. Just as liquid dnb made BlackPlastic's heart go aquiver about eight years ago by giving the genre vocals and, as a result, a tune, FabricLive 50 works because of the space the production gets. There are relatively few vocals here as it happens but the speed gives the album an intelligent, soulful feel more reminiscent of Jazzanova and the Compost label than any dnb or dubstep we ever heard.

FabricLive 50 is actually fairly reminiscent of Global Communication's Fabric album (Fabric 26), robotic yet soulful... Ferocious let subtle. By redefining what drum 'n' bass is dBridge and Instra:mental have just pushed a genre forward that desperately needed innovation. Dubstep be damned - dnb died and Autonomic just brought it back.

BP x

Check out the 30-minute promo mix over at Fabric's MixCloud page.

FabricLive 50 is out on 15 February, available for pre-order from Amazon.co.uk on CD [affiliate link].

Single Review: U Can Dance - Hell

Hell's last album Teufelswerk felt impenetrable purely due to its sheer length - it turns out that two discs of camp German techno is not necessarily always a good idea.

So the chance to focus on one track at a time is welcome, particularly when it features guest vocals from Bryan Ferry and boasts remixes from Carl Craig, Tim Goldsworthy and Simian Mobile Disco.

If you know any Hell then the original track sounds exactly as you would expect it to. It is Bryan Ferry, crooning at you through the lowered partition screen whilst you bomb it along the Autobahn in a black Limosouine at 3:30 in the morning. Ultimately it's functional but not a patch on Hell's fantastic 'Tragic Picture Show' on NY Muscle.

The remixes have a lot to live up to - RadioSlave's thirty-minute mix of 'The DJ', on which Hell was joined by a(nother) angry rant courtesy P Diddy about the fact that real DJs play it looooong ("15 minute versions!"), was clever if a little obvious but more importantly it was well executed.

Inevitably nothing here lives up to that, probably due to the source material more than anything. Carl Craig turns in two mixes, imaginatively entitled Mix One and Mix Two. The first adds a bit of synth but is a fairly functional version of the original, just re-tooled for dancefloors. Mix Two is more ambitious and strips back much of the original's production, eventually adding in a fairly serious bit of acid. Sadly when the full vocal is introduced it can't help but feel forced, and the music and vocal melodies clash. It is a shame the vocal was not applied more sparingly.

Simian Mobile Disco's mix amps up the paranoia, dousing Ferry in petrol and threatening to spit cigar butts at his head. The resulting horror show (think Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet) is much more consistent, with the vocal doing far less to constrain the track than Craig's first mix and fighting with it far less than his second. It eventually dissolves into hiss but sadly lacks the conviction to leave it that way, coming back in for the inevitably dull DJ outro.

Of all the mixes you would perhaps expect Goldsworthy to be the best positioned to handle this track, Goldsworthy having worked with Andrew Butler as Hercules & Love Affair, whose vocals share a certain pomp with Ferry. And Goldsworthy's mix is easily best - the most effortless, going with the vocal rather than against it but at its best on the percussive outro once it is abandoned.

BP x

Album Review: Acolyte - Delphic

Delphic have always pretty much had 'BlackPlastic' written all over them. At least metaphorically speaking, though we are open to sponsorship deals. Their method of writing music using laptops and then recreating the result using live instruments tends to suggest the kind of rock-influenced-dance we go all wobbly for (and we certainly enjoyed 'Counterpoint').

So the debut album was always going to be anticipated - particularly when you throw in Ewan Pearson on production duties. The references are obvious - yes, Acolyte sounds a lot like some New Order and, to be honest, even more like 2008's Friendly Fires debut.

And whilst BlackPlastic loves both of those bands it is this inherent similarity that holds Acolyte down a little. There is a danger that they don't do enough to stand out, sometimes even from themselves, with certain songs sounding similar.

Yet they can clearly write a tune. Current single 'Doubt', with sample vox rhythms and near-spoken verse is all metallic perfection, less played and more built. Both 'This Momentary' and 'Counterpoint' tread a thin line between emotional technology and plain Emo, but ultimately feel all the more engaging for it. This is dance music for the car and the train journey - a nice rhythm but it is as more about the head as the feet.

It is title track 'Acolyte', 'Remain' and the catchy 'Red Lights' that make this album though. The former is the only true instrumental, rousing and epic like trance played by a live band, whilst 'Remain' is the closest the album gets to house, with a skippy beat and warmer bass combined with a melancholic piano refrain. As the album's last track proper it makes a fitting conclusion prior, although it is a shame the progressive house blast off of 'Afterstate' got relegated to an iTunes exclusive.

'Red Lights' is the opposite of these tracks - heady, excitable and quite probably ill-advised. It's the pre-credits airport taxi-dash into the arms of the unobtainable A-list movie star. It's the excitable first kiss of punching above your romantic weight. It's leaving behind jobs, problems and history. And the enthusiasm is beautifully infectious - like watching someone so in love that it rubs off.

What the above tracks prove is that Delphic are a better band than Acolyte is an album. The contrast of 'Doubt' to 'Remain' to 'Afterstate' to 'Acolyte' to 'Red Lights' - there are enough ideas here to make a great album, it is just that what remains feels a little sub-par in comparison.

BP x

Acolyte is out now, available on Amazon.co.uk on CD and MP3 [affiliate links].

Album Revew: There Is Love In You - Four Tet

Four Tet has long been one of electronic music's true pioneers. Not satisfied with the status quo each release from Kieran Hebden seems determined to push the envelope in a slightly different fashion.

It is an approach which has won him many fans. Especially when the experimental approach has come together with the right aesthetic and, importantly, tunes, as on the legendary 'folktronica' Rounds.

And to cut a long story short There Is Love In You doesn't disappoint. Finding a happy middle ground somewhere between the slow emotive tunes of Rounds and the more 'out there' sound of Everyhing Ecstatic, Four Tet's new album sounds like someone who has finally found their natural sound. Which means the focus can truly be on the detail.

As on the slowly evolving 'Love Cry'. With its casual but tight live rhythm section and bouncing bass it is a song that wraps itself around your cranium like melting ice around a cold drink.

There Is Love In You pushes Hebden's sound simultaneously towards the organic and the electronic. With the low-slung vibes of Flying Lotus, complete with twisted vocal samples, combined with meticulously detailed, tight rhythms this album sounds like a J Dilla experiment that fell from the heavens only to be reconstructed by someone with no idea which bit goes where. And that is a glorious thing.

So this is an album that evolves things, sure... But it hasn't lost sight of what made its predecessors great.  With melodies that carry emotion and production that makes you want to move this is electronic music for all. 

Last year we benefited from a number of bands who finally sounded like they were at the top of their game - comfortable in their own sound. This is another one of those albums. There Is A Love In You doesn't change the game in the same way Rounds did. Instead it just proves Four Tet is better at the bloody game.

BP x

You can currently stream There Is Love In You in its entirety at Four Tet's SoundCloud page.

There Is Love In You is out on Domino on Monday, available for pre-order from Amazon.co.uk on CD now [affiliate link].

Album Review: The Flexible Entertainer - Pit Er Pat

Pit Er Pat's latest album is new, entitled The Flexible Entertainer and not particularly easy to sum up in a catchy soundbite at the start of a review.

Pit Er Pat's thing has always been about the atmospherics, moods and textures of their sound and this record is no different. Written for live performance on tour in Europe and later laid down in the studio it is uncompromisingly angular. The sound picks up where Gang Gang Dance's Saint Dymphna and Telepath's Dance Mother left off, carving out a rhythm from non congruent sounds.

The difference is that there is no relief. There is no pay-off. Where Saint Dymphna blows a gasket under the pressure and album-highlight 'Vacuum' sweeps in like a desert oasis, spacious and forgiving to the tracks it follows, The Flexible Entertainer just keeps on piling it on. Where Gang Gang Dance make pop music with Tinchy Stryder on 'Princes' Pit Er Pat feel far too po-faced to play with what their music could be. There are hints of R'n'B in 'Water' and the first half of 'Emperor of Charms' shines but it isn't enough.

The Flexible Entertainer is a record that thinks it is far cleverer than it really is. Snapshots intrigue but sustained listening suffocates.

Download 'Water' by Pit Er Pat on MP3 [right click, save as].

BP x

The Flexible Entertainer is out on Thrill Jockey on Monday, it is available for pre-order now from Amazon.co.uk on CD [affiliate link].