The best new singles this week
The critics’ choice
SINGLE OF THE WEEK
Mark Ambrose – The Journey Vol 3 (Repeat)
When a reissue label can muster up three volumes from one artist, it’s safe to say the artist in question has a sizeable catalogue of quality to delve into. Mark Ambrose is something of a stalwart of the UK underground, connected to that original wave of tech house which was underground in every way. Sonically, Ambrose and his peers strived to explore new terrain away from glossier kinds of house music while offering something deeper and subtler than loopy techno explosion around the turn of the millennium. At this point in time, a fervent digger culture around European minimal tech house has brought many of these tracks into a slightly more commercial scene with a pronounced business structure, but in contrast to much of the insipid, soundalike fare trotted out more recently, the quality, inventiveness and warmth of the OG material shines even brighter.
Perhaps shining is the wrong adjective to use – there’s a hushed, seductive quality to Ambrose’s work which is no doubt a key ingredient. As house reissue label Repeat slips out the third part of The Journey, it’s worth reflecting on all three volumes as an authoritative overview of the South Coast artist’s oeuvre. Particular tracks serve to highlight the spark which makes Ambrose’s tracks noteworthy in the vast annals of tech house. Take ‘Free Your Mind’, originally released under the Skymaster alias, which bounces low-end square wave lines underneath fluttering arps in a hypnotic loop which could easily stretch out well past the generous seven-minute run time. ‘My Soul, Your Soul’ twists up a head-blurring tapestry of sample snatches splashed with mellow chords, while ‘Exclusive Spirit’ creates a masterfully eerie mood with an ever-evolving palette of submerged sounds that patiently peaks towards oddly accented acid intensity.
At all times, a smoky, half-hidden mood and jazz-minded warmth pervades the mix – music made for the night, and utterly inviting with it. On Vol 3 Ambrose demonstrates his own take on the Plastikman / Josh Wink approach to a 303 with the gurgling monster ‘Acid’. ‘The Ghoulash Monster From Outer Space’ reimagines B movie dread as a deep-tracking workout destined to creep out a locked-in dancefloor, and ‘5am’ offers a blunted, subconscious workout as though Mr Fingers took a wrong turn on the way to the warehouse rave and spent the night traversing empty industrial estates until daybreak. It’s most likely the volume which will appeal the most to the more minimally-minded DJs, but equally there’s so much character etched into these beats, from the scuffed dub effects to the smudgy finish on the synths – something lost as production techniques became more refined in the decades that followed.
OW
Luca Verra, DJ Rocca, Rame, Luca Distefano – Downstair (Another Face Records)
Sometimes it only takes a few seconds to start picturing the damage a track could do to a dance floor, even if it’s the kind of slow-burn, ground-swelling mutant we’d categorise ‘Feel Better’ as. Luca Vera’s opening ode to the curveball bombshell is no wham bam effort, sounds cut from the more experimental – or at least unobvious — side of Italian dance music. A heavy, brooding, sludgy, deep dive effort, it manages to evolve, switch personality (flitting between broken knife-edge and rolling hypnosis), and emerge as an intricately detailed slice of leftfield techiness that keeps on giving, and developing, without ever overloading things or killing the sense of tension.
Shades of smoky breakbeat, distant flutterings of Italo-style synth and highly innovative, complex drum patterns, these elements are likely to mean longevity and serious re-spin appeal, and certainly make a big ‘buy it now’ statement. Suffice to say, the tune also sets expectations incredibly high for the other three here. And, while those looking for another with quite so much to delve into might find themselves coming up a little short, everything here is nonetheless Grade-A refined, making a very strong case for whatever’s happening over at Another Face Records.
Take Rame’s ‘Bow Down’, for example: a gorgeous, grooving six minutes of infectiously percussive, organic feeling house that combines sunset pads and keys with acid warbles. ‘Epsylon’, DJ Rocca’s offering, precedes with loose, wide open handclaps, snare-topped low tempo electro drum patterns and wistful melodies. Meanwhile, final stab ‘Be Kind’ sees Luca Distefano adopt the most direct approach via ‘Be Kind’. All filtered, echoed harmony and punchy, propellant deep techno bounce, highs playfully swap in and out to exceptional effect — seeming to switch up and down tempo, then side-to-side, without speed actually factoring into the equation at all. Real stand out stuff.
MH
Oma Totem – Exercisis Ritmics (Hivern Discs)
We’re not exactly sure who Oma Totem is, but a breadcrumb trail of compilation appearances on Hivern Discs and Kalahari Oyster Cult leads to this outstanding debut EP on John Talabot’s label. Hivern has become a hotbed of rhythmic exploration in recent times, making this record a natural addition to the catalogue as it toys with expressive, densely layered percussion and psychoactive processing.
It’s clear from the start of the functionally titled ‘ER1’ Totem’s approach aligns with the subtle, refined experiments in fractured, organic dance music you can also hear on labels like Blank Mind and Oscilla Sound. There’s a techno impulse to the structure and momentum, but the overall palette is heavily tipped towards traditional percussion.
There’s plenty of room for synthesis and lysergic effects swells, plus strident kicks on the likes of ‘ER2’, and you could imagine this EP slotting in comfortably alongside the Livity Sound strain of non-conformist beat tracks, but dubstep bass pressure isn’t considered a priority. Rather, it’s spatial sound design and sustained drum hypnosis which shapes this out as potent material for anyone keen to instigate the most ritualistic kind of engagement on the dancefloor.
Exercisis Ritmics maintains one mode of approach across five tracks, and perhaps it would be interesting to see where else Totem could take these sounds in the future, but the quality and clarity of the creative intention makes this an essential release for anyone in thrall to the seductive power of rhythm.
OW
Spekki Webu – Euclidean Doorway EP (Beyond The Bridge)
There has been a spate of reissues of early Spiral Tribe releases lately which highlight the subtlety and psychedelic qualities of their fabled free party tekno. As derivative sounds have mutated towards harder or more overtly nihilistic fodder for the field-based dance, some of the initial subtlety of the sound has arguably been lost along the way. That’s a broad generalisation, but it’s relevant when considering this debut solo EP from lauded Dutch DJ Spekki Webu, who clutches the fierce tempos of free parties to his chest as he strides forward into parts unknown.
There’s a sense of the intrepid psychedelic explorer about Webu, whose DJ sets have been plenty flexible in terms of pace and presence. What’s immediately apparent taking in the depth and breadth of his Euclidean Doorway EP is how brilliantly bewildering his sound is. There’s a metallic, atonal quality to the thick daubs of tone and texture writhing on top of the mix, but not in a typically industrial manner. Rather, the overtones bend and writhe on top of the rapid thrum of kick drums, sculpted with a frequency-minded attitude hell bent on triggering psychedelic responses in those caught in the sound waves.
Even the drums themselves are deployed with more finesse than your typical free tekno, with kicks that ripple rather than rampage no matter how fast they are. There are no seismic drops or other such arrangement theatrics – the shifts in the tracks emerge from halls of mirrors and lead down mysterious corridors, sometimes tunnelling deep into the sodden earth, at other times lifting high above the forest canopy. For such mechanical music, there’s a living, breathing quality which feels attuned to the intensity of nature – something any receptor-enhanced raver amongst the trees can surely relate to.
OW
K Alexi Shelby – Bad Manners 11 (Bad Manners)
Marcel Dettmann has been using his Bad Manners label to indulge his broader musical obsessions beyond the austere Berlin techno he’s so readily associated with. That’s not to say it’s a departure from driving 4/4, but rather the sound palette is broader and more playful. Following entries from the likes of Mono Junk, Anthony Rother and Inga Mauer, Dettmann reaches out to Chicago house royalty K Alexi Shelby for a trip into the heart of prototypical Windy City machine magic.
Shelby’s sound is often foregrounded by his steamy vocal come-ons, and there’s no denying he’s made some truly hot records in his time, but from a production perspective he also ranks as one of the most visionary of the Chicago originators, edging especially tweaked synthesis into his jack which helped land him on Detroit labels as well as those from his home town. His release for Bad Manners is true to that sound from so many decades prior, but it doesn’t feel tired in the way so many throwback records can.
If ‘Far Beyond’ has the raw structure of a classic Trax joint, it also gleams around the high notes and leaps forth on the drums with a subtle refinement. But Shelby still knows where the ineffable flair of the early records came from, when the mix down wasn’t everything and some of the best tracks also sounded sonically ‘wrong’. ‘Season of the Real’ is all over the place, the vocals a little too hot, the tops and mids splashing into each other, the piano chords sounding like they’ve been stripped for parts, and it’s dripping with vibe. It might scare off DJs or fickle crowds, but the expression is true and urgent, much like the title suggests.
You just can’t fake that sense of realness, and Shelby sounds free to celebrate his mammoth legacy with four tracks that could come from no-one else.
OW
John Heckle – Return To Titan (Intrinsic Rhythm)
In recent years John Heckle has been primarily focused on his Head Front Panel alias, parking his earlier established melodic jackers par excellence in favour of a harder, more industrial sound. In both modes, Heckle has always displayed uncanny flair – someone who truly sings through his machines – and five years on from the last releases under his own name, he returns to the more playful, synth-charged aspect of his output in a dazzling display for Tr One’s Intrinsic Rhythm.
While he might sport a slightly more approachable style away from Head Front Panel, Heckle is still boisterous as hell on this record. ‘A’ bucks and brays with hard-swung drums caked in noise, and the lead lines peal out with an urgency bordering on hysterical, not to mention joyous. There’s always a sense of early Detroit techno’s balance of machine soul and slamming intensity in his work, made by one who innately understands how to keep the music funky as hell, no matter how hard or anthemic you push it.
From the slower stomp of ‘7C’ to the drum-less baroque epic ‘CII’, the sheer invention and power of Heckle’s expression is nothing short of astounding. It makes so much other modern techno seem tepid and uninspiring in comparison. It’s only fitting, then, that a Motor City legend like John Beltran is dialled up for a remix, and he turns ‘A’ into a sizzling, sky-scraping beauty that makes for a tasteful, if slightly less thrilling, alternative vision of Heckle’s own tune.
OW
Pissed Jeans – No Convenient Apocalypse (Sub Pop)
Barrelling out of Pennsylvania with a sound to shake Hades’ gates, Pissed Jeans are back after five years silence, and you’d best be ready. ‘No Convenient Apocalypse’ lays the grubby groundwork for their sixth LP, and their sounding as monstrously brilliant as they did spitting into earshot in the mid-00s. The unique appeal of the band lies in their balance of hardcore punk at sludgy tempos and the horn-dog riffs wrenched from their guitars – strangely catchy even as they bludgeon you into submission.
Lyrically, Matt Kosloff continues to lay waste to the pathetic qualities of the human experience, positively sneering at society’s head-in-the-sand approach to the earth’s numerous problems. “We’re screwed,” the band shout as one voice, and as ever they’re funny because they’re right. The thunderous, drunk-but-tight noise exploding around the doom-laden message is absolutely on-message, too. Harbingers of dread they might be, but they’re also acerbic with it.
As a bonus treat, the B side features a live version of ‘Bathroom Laughter’ from their 2013 album Honeys, captured at the end of a set in their hometown Allentown. It’s a visceral demonstration of how formidable they are on stage as well as on record.
OW
This week’s reviewers: Oli Warwick, Martin Hewitt.