NICOLAS JAAR

Review: Back in 2011, Nicolas Jaar joined forces with fellow Clown & Sunset contributor Dave Harrington for the Darkside EP, an impressive trio of untitled tracks that pitted the formers scratchy, near-paranoid production style against the latter's penchant for lo-fi indie-rock inspired fuzziness. Here, the duo dusts down the Darkside alias once more for a first collaborative album. Predictably, it's an impressive set, offering a collection of downtempo tracks that shuffle between crackly, out-there atmospherics ("Sitra", reminiscent of much of Jaar's Space is Only Noise album), echo-laden alt-rock experimentalism ("Heart") and heart-aching fragility (the James Blake-ish "Greek Light").

Review: OK, wow. We cannot believe it has been 10 years since Niclas Jaar's impressive Space Is Only Noise album. At the time he was a young buck, dallying in house and techno but clearly always about sp much more. The cover of this record finds the young artist in a buggy in no-mans-land next to the Berlin wall and that's a fine metaphor for his musical style. It's filled with samples, found sounds, delicate piano playing and is suited to the late night hours, where time slows down and deep thought takes over. It sounds as usual and unique now as it did back then.

Review: Having kept his silence for much of the past four years, Nicolas Jaar has finally broken cover to release not one but two new albums under his given name. Telas, which follows the highly personal and critically acclaimed Cenizas, was recorded largely in isolation and consists of four lengthy aural tracts strewn across four sides of wax. Almost entirely beat-free and ambient, it sees Jaar make use of all manner of custom-made instruments, squally jazz horns, unusual instrumentation (a bass clarinet features heavily on one cut) and his usual evocative electronics to create slowly-shifting epics that variously doff a cap to Reich/Riley/Glass style minimalism, Stockhausen-esque sound collage, the ambient works of Brian Eno and, most impressively, the 'Fourth World' sounds of Jon Hassell.

Review: Back in 2016, Jah Wobble offered up a two-disc trawl through the more dub-fired corners of his vast back catalogue, In Dub. While that set included dub tracks and self-made reworks that spanned the whole of his then 40-year career, this belated sequel concentrates on material made since 1990. As you'd expect given Wobble's track record, there's little straight-up dub reggae present, but rather a ton of hazy, delay-laden musical fusions that mix and match elements of ambient, electronica, post-punk, no-wave, traditional Indian music, trip-hop, psychedelia, jazz and even dense, tribal style drum tracks - all laden with the sometime Public Image Ltd member's trademark weighty bass. Throw in some never-before-heard mixes and previously vinyl-only versions, and you have another fine collection of heady, dub-wise fusions.

Review: Having kept his silence for much of the past four years, Nicolas Jaar has finally broken cover to release not one but two new albums under his given name. Telas, which follows the highly personal and critically acclaimed Cenizas, was recorded largely in isolation and consists of four lengthy aural tracts strewn across four sides of wax. Almost entirely beat-free and ambient, it sees Jaar make use of all manner of custom-made instruments, squally jazz horns, unusual instrumentation (a bass clarinet features heavily on one cut) and his usual evocative electronics to create slowly-shifting epics that variously doff a cap to Reich/Riley/Glass style minimalism, Stockhausen-esque sound collage, the ambient works of Brian Eno and, most impressively, the 'Fourth World' sounds of Jon Hassell.