Album Review: Future Disco Volume 4: Neon Nights - Various

The Future Disco albums always look as if they are a little too cynical to be any good. The concept just feels too well worn, too obvious.

Yet every time BlackPlastic hears a new one there is always enough to impress, and the same definitely goes for Future Disco Volume Four, subtitled Neon Nights. In fact, we'd go so far as to say that volume four is probably the best yet.

Things start well, with Greg Wilson's mix of a cover of Dillinger's 'Cocaine' by Escort - a wobbly heavy-based take on a classic. But it is Stefano e Bene's 'Why Your Love' that really kicks things off, starting off a series of absolute gems... The transition into the Classixx Acapulco mix of Holy Ghost's 'I Will Come Back' is beautiful. And what's more this is easily Holy Ghost's best track since 'Hold On' - exactly the kind of classic house with attitude we had been yearning for.

Ray Mang's mix of 'Ocean' by 2020 Soundsystem is equally epic - subtle and cool but with lush muted vocals running through the song - and then the listener is treated to Bad Rabbits' 'She's Bad', which we have already declared our affection for. Next up is 'Zombie Tropicana' by Hannulerauri, a track which sounds like something New Order would have made if they never came back from Ibiza after making Technique and had instead just kept on the E and given up wearing clothes. In other words, expect lush basslines, warm synths and a pervading sense of loved up apathy.

Elsewhere Tape To Tape's 'Pure & Easy' shines for it's sprinkling of starlight and peaking basslines and the double dose of Kaine feat. Kathy Diamond's 'Love Saves The Day' really pays off when it hits the original mix but in all honesty it is the middle third that really makes this album special.

In the age of MP3 blogs and Soundcloud mixes proper mix albums are feeling increasingly rare - each good one feels like it my be the last. You could worse than make Future Disco Four the last one you buy.

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Future Disco Volume 4: Neon Nights out on Need Want on 7 February, available to pre-order from Amazon.co.uk on CD or MP3 [affiliate links].

Album Review: Life Index - Maceo Plex

Maceo Plex's Life Index at times threatens greatness.

The start is a stark invitation - 'I'm A Metaphor' feels like a statement of intent. It's twisted spoken vocal taking the listener on a journey before any rhythms have even really begun. As the clunking industrialism of 'Gravy Train' rides in Life Index begins to feel like a modern update on the classic techno formula. It sounds like the future was supposed to sound.

Single 'Vibe Your Love' is a Minimal Techno Soul Ballad that really hits the mark. The spaced out, clinical swooshes in the background providing a wrapping of loneliness to the vocal. 'You & Me' feels like it actually dates back to eighties Detroit - synths stab through the rhythm and the melody is driven and focused. 'Love Your Style' is at once sensual yet tough and uncompromising. This is music for proper warehouses, not nightclubs.

Best of all is 'Arise', a track which manages to feel like the pressure valve on your brain giving in as everything leaks out. The distorted preacher's vocal, calling on the listener to "arise", lays atop a sinister bassline and the track gives you just enough to leave you wanting more. The whole thing smacks of class - less is more and Maceo Plex knows it.

The problem is that he doesn't know that less can also be less. For every track here that serves as a revelation there is another that suffers from being dull and turgid. It is difficult to pinpoint the problem - 'Silo' for example boasts the same stripped back approach as all of the above tracks, plus a touch of brass, but it just feels flaccid in comparison to the best tracks here.

Life Index is a good album, but at 79 minutes there just needs to be less of it. Listening to it in one go just emphasises the highlights and leaves parts of the album feeling cold.

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Life Index is released through Crosstown Rebels on 31 January, available to pre-order from Amazon.co.uk on CD and MP3.

Album Review: DJ-Kicks - Various mixed by Apparat

The DJ-Kicks series appears to be hitting something of a stride... With several notable releases this year already in the bag, The Juan Maclean's being a particular highlight, here comes one more from IDM innovator Apparat.

And Apparat's entry certainly doesn't drop the ball. To a certain extent it does what you would expect... It's intelligent, electronic music that is built more for home listening than the dance floor, but the quality of the music and timing is good enough to make listening (repeatedly) a pleasure.

Things start off fairly heavily with Apparat's own 'Circles' - what feels almost like a trance track with a cinematic world-music guitar motif - before getting dubby on fellow IDM-ers Telefon Tel Aviv's 'Lengthening Shadows'. From there things spin out in multiple directions. This is a mix that is one moment cold, hard and clinical and the next warm and embracing.

The latter is best demonstrated by Four Tet's stunning remix of 'I Need A Life' by Born Ruffians... A track that manages to simultaneously feel like the heat of summer and joy of Christmas. It creates a neat centre for the album before things turn darker on Vincent Markowski's classic 'The Madness Of Moths' and Four Tet and Burial's 'Moth'. As Thom Yorke's haunting 'Harrowdown Hill' emerges from Ramadanman's 'Tempest' there is a stark urban feel to this album that shows the influence of Apparat's recent collaborations with Modeselektor.

The album closes on Tim Hecker's ambient melancholy drenched 'Borderlands'. Apparat's DJ-Kicks album is a serious business and that may alienate some, but it is a testament to how a good mix album can be much more than the reconstruction of a live DJ set. This is a mix album with more emotional punch and ambition than most electronic artists manage on their own studio albums, and for that BlackPlastic salutes it.

BP x

DJ-Kicks by Apparat is out now, available from Amazon.co.uk on CD, LP and MP3.

Album Review: Christmas Gift - Various

Rainboot's Christmas Gift is a compilation truly in the spirit of the times... A set of fourteen understated, folky, Christmas influenced tracks where all of the takings go straight to a good cause - Save The Children.

For any label to do such a thing takes balls. For it to be a boutique such as Rain Boot is really rather generous (and brave) - they came to BlackPlastic's attention earlier this year when they put out the Whiskey Priest's superb Wave and Cloud. And that surprisingly blunt yet beautiful record is a good demonstration of what to expect.

This truly is the anti-X Factor. Whilst many in the UK alternative scene get behind John Cage's (rather excellent) '4:33' for Christmas number one most of the tracks on this album would make a much more fitting replacement. These are warts-and-all Christmas songs - the second act blues of A Charlie Brown Christmas, prior to the realisation of the true meaning of Christmas. It is the aural equivalent of turning your back on Argos, pulling your collar up and walking off into the cold, present-less, because all that really matters is who you spend it with (not what you spend it on).

There are certainly stronger and weaker moments here. Tyler Butler is battered and bruised on 'Waxwing' whilst The Animal Beat feel cautiously optimistic on 'Love Again'. Unsurprisingly, given the quality of Wave and Cloud, The Whiskey Priest delivers the gut-wrenching 'It Came Upon A Midnight Clear' and this contrasts with the beautifully coquettish 'Waiting To Find Me', from Sara Lewis. Where things stray into full on ballad territory is where BlackPlastic struggles a little - Travis Tucker's 'O Holy Night' is an epic Christmas song, it just feels a little over-delivered in contrast to the rest of the album.

Overall though you can't fault the package, and you certainly can't fault the sentiment. With all of the cover price going to a good cause we whole heartedly recommend you check out Christmas Gift.

BP x

Christmas Gift is out now on Rainboot, visit the Rainboot site for details on where to buy (including a pay what you want option at Bandcamp).

Single Review: I Can't Wait / Rock Me - Russ Yallop

Russ Yallop's 'I Can't Wait' is a bit of a master of deception. From the first minute you would be forgiven for thinking this is some sort of funky-house jam. The elements are all there: four-four, filters, female vocal.

Yet almost as soon as that minute is up Yallop treats us to a bass line heavy enough to dispel any illusions. Sure - it's house. And it's certainly funky. But this is a long way from anything described by the two labels together. Packed with snap, crackle and pop 'I Can't Wait' practically fizzes out of the sound system, melting the electronics on its way out. It boasts a lovely organic and analogue feel which, combined with some serious low-end, sounds like Chicken Lips at their best.

B-side 'Rock Me' is similar but with less compromise. There is even less vocal, instead just a moan, yet a lovely disco stab is worked into things to give the track it's hook before finally opening up and blossoming in the song's final quarter into a full on soul sample... And then back to the dark techno drums i goes, a brief flirt in the sunlight brought to an end all too soon.

So this is what minimal sounds like when you aren't afraid to fuck with it: awesome.

Check out a preview below:

I Can't Wait-Crossroads-Rock Me by Russ Yallop

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