If you're going to wait nine years to produce your debut album, it helps to have a concept. Drum and bass veteran Raiden's theme is the brutalist modern architecture of the 1960s (hence the Beton Arme title), with all bar one of the tracks named after striking - some may say ugly - modernist buildings. While this may seem a touch pretentious, it helps give the album context. You can certainly feel the influence of the stark, soulless concrete constructions in tracks like "Barbican", "Tricolour", "Ryugyong" and "Habitat 67" - all angular rhythms, fuzzy percussion, icy stabs and faded basslines. Yet for all the brutalist inspiration, there's moody funk, too - something for which Raiden should be given great credit.
