TIN MAN Vinyl & CDs

Review: Club scene doyen, dance music veteran, and rave culture hero Johannes Auvinen opts to depart from the dance floor, at least for the time being, and deliver Arles - an ode to the other side of the electronic-acid scene, those sounds that make most sense after the chaos and carnage of a party have subsided and you're safely home on the couch with you and yours and all dearest.
And it works as well as it should, with the experience both of living in that world and making anthems for it clearly evident in the overall production quality and ideas. Arles is a warm blanket, that friendly therapist, an album that understands where you've been because it was there too. Remarkably, despite what that may suggest, this is not ambient or particularly leftfield stuff. Instead, it's rhythmic, pop-infused electronica goodness, for want of a more succinct, less awkward turn of phrase.

Review: The good folks at Salon have got some more signature acid weirdness out of Tin Man here with the new single 'Shooting Stars'. It's a slow-motion and druggy downtempo pop lullaby with pensive spoken word mutterings. Elsewhere the Monkey Nenufar Vata remix of 'Electric Blue' is a rather mid-tempo roller with a playful rhythm, fleshy drums and meandering acid lines next to distant pads that are delightfully catchy. It becomes more dubbed out and minimal on the A2 then Tobias layers up crispy drum breaks and silvery hits on his remix of 'Love Sickness.' A varied and vital EP for sure.