Album Review: The Orange Collection - Eskimo Recordings

What comes after pink, blue and green? Well according to Eskimo Recordings it is orange... And so they follow up The Green Collection with this new offering, The Orange Collection - the fourth entry in their colour and emotion inspired series.

As my previous coverage of these releases highlights my feelings on these albums have been mixed. Yet I still find it hard to resist giving each new entry a listen, if only out of some desire to recapture some of the glittering brilliance of Eskimo's earlier compilations. The Orange Collection does its best to return your effort in listening to it. Unlike the other entries, which usually felt no real connection to the colour in question, entitling this The Orange Collection makes sense. It's warm, sitting on the edge of sunset... Though whether this is a deliberate refinement of focus or a happy coincidence is up for debate. Perhaps Eskimo simply got around to picking one of the most Balearic of colours 

Eskimo has retained its latter-day fondness for soft electronics and indie vocals but in contrast to previous entries this album feels as Mediterranean influenced as it does Scandinavian, conjuring the feeling of beaches and beachside swimming pools.

It is therefore fitting then that opening track Odds Are Good by Anoraak feels exactly like a dip in a pool out in the sun. Renegades, by Majestique feat. Lakshmi, is similarly sunny... Warm pads and synth stabs creating an infectious and wistful sense, almost like missing the holiday before it has even ended. Like most things here it is almost shockingly polished, but that adds to the perfect summer holiday feeling.

Hold It Like You Own It by Horixon and Maya is a glittering moment of electronic pop - a powerful vocal hook riding a deep sine wave baseline. The album also features two tracks I've featured recently - Du Tonc's Animals and This Soft Machine's On & On - and both feel right at home here in this set.

Amongst all the shimmering pop are some more wonky moments. Moscoman's Fernandez is a hit of Italo-influenced dub that sounds like it soundtracks your weirdest cowboy dreams... Drums clatter as a stark lone guitar riff picks its way amidst a world of synth-kitsch. Elsewhere Marvin and Guy's Unfailling Fall is a deep psychedelic trip, a stark contrast to the lighter moments that make up most of this album.

Closing with the Mees Dierdorp remix of Hydrogen Sea's Wear Out, The Orange Collection comes grinding to a dramatic stop. Synthetic strings swirl and vocals cry out as the album draws to a emotional yet somewhat muted finish. It is by far the best entry in this series yet, and the best album from Eskimo in some time. It is hard not to think this may just be good luck - a number of artists here have featured on previous entries after all - but perhaps they just managed to do a much better job curating the collection this time. Either way, take this with you to the pool this summer and you are guaranteed just a little warmth, no matter the weather.

The Orange Collection is released through Eskimo Recordings on 4 May. Pre-order on iTunes here [affiliate link].

EP Review: Artefact - Max Cooper & Tom Hodge

The Artefact EP is the second collaborative release from electronic producer Max Cooper and pianist Tom Hodge and in short, it is stunning.

Opening with the melancholic Remnants, Hodge's piano work is sublime. Layer upon layer of gently nurtured melodies build up atop Cooper's intricately navigated and highly complex percussive electronics. The result is cinematic, emotive and beautiful - and delivers on the song's ambition to recreate the sense of objects and sounds that can trigger an emotional response. Those remnants that pull the emotion right out of you, either catching you unaware when you least expect it or used when we have an instinctive need to reminisce and to feel just a bit... More.

Teotihuacan Part 2 is based on field recordings taken from Cooper’s 2012 visit to the pyramids of Teotihuacan - a culture he describes as "destroyed and its knowledge lost, replaced with a rebuilt, but still beautiful, tourist trap". Audio for a storm whipping through the city is processed and used within the track, and the piece recreates a sad sense of loss.

Finally, on Resonant Expanse, Cooper edits, tweaks and heavily manipulates Hodge's piano work into a slowly building and wholly electronic piece. Distorted melodies build and loop to create something tougher but equally emotive.

Artefact successfully delivers instrumental electronic music with beauty and surprising emotional complexity.

Artefact is out through FIELDS on Monday. Download free bonus track Teotihuacan Part 1 from MaxCooper.net now. Check out a preview of Remnants below:

Stream: Business of Emotion (Lefti Remix) - Big Data

Infectious sugar-rush electronic pop from Big Data, a project from Harvard graduate Alan Wilkis, remixed here by Lefti. The original version of Business of Emotion is taken from Big Data's latest album 2.0, which features guest spots from a range of big names including Twin Shadow, Jamie Liddell and Weezer's Rivers Cuomo.

The press-sheet name-checks early-years Justice on this, and it is hard not to hear some of their shinier and more colourful moments in the sounds on display here.

Stream: U Got - SIVIK

Another killer track from LA artist SIVIK, following on from High a couple of weeks ago. U Got is a similarly great slice of futuristic R&B - where High was about the heat of the initial attraction, U Got is about what follows...

EP Review: Synesthesiac - Jack Garratt

Jack Garratt is rapidly sizing up to be one of this year's most exciting artists, with lots of blog love and radio hype. As such it is with some excitement that I greeted his latest EP, his sophomore release Synesthesiac.

The release opens with the experimental-ambient-post-garage of Synesthesia Pt. 1, a track that sounds unlike almost anything I've heard before. A lounge piano loop rubs up against elephant-sized slobbering bass before dissolving into thin air, eventual re-materialising as the haunting intro to The Love You're Given, and the scene is set.

That lead single The Love You're Given remains Garratt's greatest track is no backhanded compliment - it is such an incredible piece of music and here it stands tall within it's carefully crafted surroundings. That it is so careful intertwined within Synesthesiac is almost cause for disappointment - it suggests that the song is unlikely to make a reappearance on Garratt's debut, when we inevitably get one, and boy does it deserve wider repeated listening. At turns delicately weeping and then gut-churningly heavy, this song feels like three different artist's best records all at once - shimmering falsetto soul, Earth-shattering bass and cut-up folk tangled up into one five-minute long masterpiece.

Chemical is similar in exhibiting Garratt's willingness to cut 'n' shut disparate genres, ferocious beats lending his vocals a sinister and determined edge. It never quite achieves the same sheer intensity of emotion but it remains an incredible track.  Finally Lonesome Valley delivers slowly looping blues, full of fuzzy kick drums and distorted bass, and gradually builds towards the EP's epic release.

Synesthesiac is an EP that reaches beyond the four songs it contains to create something far more significant than the format can normally deliver. If you want to hear the sound of the future, Garratt is a safe bet.

Synesthesiac is out now on Duly Noted Records. Listen to All The Love You're Given and Chemical below, or purchase the EP on iTunes [affiliate link].