Warszawa: Kinetica EP
Carbon12

Ken Holewczynski, who makes music under the Warszawa name, is hardly new to the game. After founding Arts Industria, he issued a number of releases (initially cassettes, then CDs) by Manhole Vortex, Thine Eyes, Epoch, and Sphere Lazza (including his own material under the Signal to Noise and Diode aliases) during the 1990s. Today, Holewczynski's focus is Warszawa and the Carbon12 imprint, which he established in 2012. On the generous thirty-seven-minute Kinetica EP (limited to 100 hand-numbered CD copies), Warszawa deftly fuses elements of glitch, drum'n'bass, IDM, electro-funk, and synth-pop—thankfully not all at once—into four originals and two remix treatments.

It takes a minute for “Interkosmos” to come into clear focus, specifically when its glitchy beat appears. It's then that Warszawa's particular brand of spacey electro-funk asserts itself most directly, a style that also allows room for brooding sci-fi atmospheres and pop melodies within the mix. Holewczynski follows that moodscape with “Wostock,” an equally punchy throwdown that in this case underlies trippy synth textures with a thrumming drum'n'bass pattern. The skittering beats and minimal melodic patterns in “SpaceTimeDb,” by contrast, might remind listeners of a certain age of Autechre in its Tri Repetae period, while scratchy drums give “Dscnt” a raw feel, though that's counterbalanced by the tune's IDM melodies and electro-funk vibe. At EP's end, “Interkosmos” receives two bonus makeovers, the first, “Gulag Lockdown,” a heavy, Einstürzende Neubauten-styled EBM (Electronic Body Movement) tribute and the second, “Interkosmos dbspcmx,” a dark and beatless exploration of deep space. As might be obvious, the release sometimes plays like a history of past-and-present electronic music genres, though that shouldn't be construed as a knock against it.

March 2013