The Office #8

Review: The Subliminal Kid – To The South

Label: Off-Key Industries
Catalog#: OKLTD 003

Tracklist:
A: To The South

B: To The South – Matt O’Brien Remix

Buy here

The Kid of Sweden delivers a limited 12″ with one of the heaviest tracks that passed along this year. The focus on the original is around a hard hitting, no frills but yet so funky groove combined with a swirling synthline that appears from now and then, getting transformed to various shapes – and then suddenly stops to make room for the heavyweight beat. Excellent work that surley will break your subs.

Matt O’Brien’s remix takes the track to a different level, with a dub vibe combined with static percussion and a different depth in the rhythm. Nautical spheres that gets entangled in The Subliminal Kid’s atmospheric melody, that also get’s a treatment from O’Brien who shuffles the notes around to create a different sound.

Absolute destroyer.

Chart: March 2009

1. Stereociti – Untitled / Mojuba

2. Norman Nodge – Maniac / MDR

3. Liberty City – If You Really Want Someone – The MURK Groove / Tribal

4. The Off-Key Hat – Emergency Calling / Dissident

5. Shed – The Lower Upside Down – Surgeon Remix / Ostgut Ton

6. Unknown – Submariner / HATE

7. Radio Slave – Neverending….. / Ostgut Ton

8. “Unknown” – “Bosch Mix”

9. “Unknown” – Emotion Reset

10. Tony Lionni – Found A Place / Ostgut Ton

I wish I lived in the UK…

Review: Tony Lionni & Radio Slave – Berghain 03 Part 1

Label: Ostgut Tonträger
Catalog#: o-ton22

Tracklist:

A: Tony Lionni – Found A Place

B: Radio Slave – Neverending…..

As Len Faki is doing the Berghain 03 mix CD, the followup to André Galluzzi and Marcel Dettmann’s previous showcases, Ostgut Ton releases two vinyls (as they also did previously) with the unreleased tracks from the mix CD.

Starting off with Tony Lionni’s contagious and right-at-the-front house track, the mood is set. From quite a number of heavy and dark techno releases on Ostgut, this track fits perfectly as a small break. Reaching through a lot of different feelings with ‘Found A Place’ on the A-side, I get the impression that Lionni knows the feelings of Panoramabar as well as Berghain, but also pursuing his own sound under the direction of those places and feelings.

‘Found A Place’ is one of those tracks that, if you accept what you are hearing and just feel like dancing, you’ll love this one at the height of a great DJ set. It’s very emotional, structured and actually quite deep – the only thing that would need some more work is the beat, it lacks a bit of… oumph!

Radio Slave on the other hand, with his never ending signature sound, display a slightly different mood and groove with his track ‘Neverending…..’ on the flip. Grabbing his really special DJ sets at both Panoramabar and Berghain, he fuses a lot of dirt into this one, making it reach different levels of progression and sound structure. Resembling maybe a bit too much to the track ‘RJ’ on Running Back, the mood is really different here. I get a sense that Matt Edwards has taken this proven sound, transformed it back to his roots and then reached a whole new level of “forward”.

Because forward is what it’s all about.

Review: Shed – Remixes

Label: Ostgut Tonträger
Catalog#: o-ton20

Tracklist:
A: The Lower Upside Down – Surgeon Remix

B: Another Wedged Chicken – Martyn’s 131 Remix

Recommended!

Buy here

First(?) remixes of Shed’s album, finally! Revibed by two other forward thinking artists on a 12″ that is one of the most dynamic remix vinyls I’ve heard this year.

Shed’s electronica-wise track ‘The Lower Upside Down’ gets a completely different attitude and structure by beat scientist Surgeon, who not only manage to fuse a dancefloor vibe to it, he also rearranges the melody into a much more haunting state, switching up the progression of it and transforming it to something completely new. You need to focus to be able to hear it though.

Martyn’s take on ‘Another Wedged Chicken’ has been played a lot more than Surgeon’s remix. It’s a dancefloor friendly remix on one of the best tracks from ‘Shedding The Past’. Putting the structure around a vocal hook is a really clever idea, but only get’s it’s righteous space in a club and in the right sense. Also, Martyn manages to fuse a lot of his own sound to it which is nice and all, but I’d rather see it being a bit more heavy than it is.

Chart: Early March 2009

1. Gustaf – Live at The Office, 14 February 2009 – 05:25-07:10?

2. “Unknown” – Untitled Promo

3. Staffan Linzatti – See / Stockholm LTD

4. Fever Ray – When I Grow Up – We Grow Apart Inspiration by Pär Grindvik / Rabid

5. Loco Dice – Tight Laces – Marcel Dettmann Response 2 / Desolat

6. Loco Dice – Black Truffles In The Snow – Mike Huckaby’s S Y N T H Remix / Desolat

7. Johannes – Live at The Office, 14 February 2009 – 00:00-01:00

8. Loco Dice – Tight Laces – Marcel Dettmann Response 1 / Desolat

9. Ben Klock – Subzero / Ostgut Tonträger

10. Radio Slave – Koma Koma / Rekids

Review: Martyn – Great Lengths

Label: 3024
Catalog#: 3024-005

Tracklist:
1. The Only Choice
2. krdl-t-grv
3. right?star!
4. Seventy Four
5. Little Things
6. Vancouver
7. These Words feat. dBridge
8. Bridge
9. Elden St.
10. Far Away
11. Hear Me
12. Is This Insanity? feat. Spaceape
13. Brilliant Orange
14. Natural Selection
15. Secret track???

Martyn’s anticipated album is due in two weeks on the 3024 label, which has a well recieved back catalogue that gets even more solid with this CD.

Martyn has a very defining dubstepXtechno sound, which is at taste with many DJs and fans alike. I personally got a bit tired of that perticular sound after a while, but this album really brings it to a different level. Pushing techno and dubstep into each other with a lot of style and original perception of the two, the sound seems to always come together in a pleasant mix of the energy from the broken beats and uncompromizing sound of techno.

The first track let us know that the 3024 label is the only choice – a track that easily could seem redicilous, but the way Martyn pulls it off it becomes a track that marks the attitude and self confidence that the album indeed has.

Continuing over to ‘krdl-t-grv’ and ‘right?star!’, which probably will be the most frequently played tracks of the album, a harder edge of the sound gets introduced. A sound that first came to the Martyn/3024-world with the fantastic ‘Vancouver’ (which is also on the album). Although I’d settle with the harder edge, Martyn displays a wide arrangement of styles over his own past releases which with all right should be represented on his debut album. The fourth track ‘Seventy Four’ is my least favorite track. It’s alright, just a bit boring. With ‘Little Things’, the dub vibe gets all the focus, making it a interesting piece and a special track. ‘Vancouver’ on the next is just as good as it has always been, placed perfectly on the album.

You can clearly hear a sort of Hyperdub-ish R&B influence on the track ‘These Words’, that features the voice of dBridge from the UK. An effort that I find very interesting and the result is very different. It will take a while to settle with it.

The interlude ‘Bridge’, a track that’s based on an organical piano line and no beats – fits perfectly as a bridge to the last tracks of the CD.

‘Elden St’ is a great track that has a faster paced groove to it that the others, as well as a sound that feels more detailed and processed. Great energy!

The same energy is transformed in ‘Far Away’, which sounds like a hommage to jungle than anything else. After a slowly building intro, a heavy and impressive beat structure gets the space it deserves. The other elements do subtle transformations around this structure which keeps the sound interesting and powerful.

A STL-ish vibe gets fuelled by Martyn on ‘Hear Me’, a track that has a house vibe to it but features drums that pushes it into a stepping groove. Fantastic track. ‘Is This Insanity?’ with The Spaceape, it sounds like it’s recorded in the same session as ‘Hear Me’, but with the spacious ape on the microphone. This is a really tripping track which sounds more like a UK production with a aware sense to it.

The second ambient material of the CD is also placed perfectly. Moving out the darkened sense of the tracks between ‘Bridge’ and ‘Brilliant Orange’, it takes things into a calmer sound. Spacious synths and a melancholic wall of sound brings in another dimension of Martyn’s music.

My favorite tracks:

Elden St.

Far Away

Hear Me

Secret Track? / Unknown? / ??????