textura

Albums
Alsace Lorraine
Becuzzi & Orsi
Andreas Bertilsson
Cheju
Coleclough & Liles
Dev/Null
DJ Bone
eRikm (Ferrari) & Lehn
Fisk Industries
Fridge
Hanna Hartman
Jazkamer
Laub
Madagascar
Manasyt
Mus
Organum
Pandatone
People Press Play
Laurent Perrier
Porn Sword Tobacco
Pylône
Milford Reynolds
Rumskib
Skeletons and Kings
Ran Slavin
Stateless
Televise
Throbbing Gristle
Tied + Tickled Trio
Akello Uchenna
Brendan Walls
John Watermann
Mark Williams
YACHT
Z'ev / David Linton
Zonk't

Compilations / Mixes
Beat Dimensions Vol. 1
Buzzin' Fly Vol. 4
Hernan Cattaneo
Hot Chip
Jamie Jones

3"/ 7"/ 10"/ 12"/ EPs
A Guy Called Gerald
Ambivalent
Apparat
Atone
Audion
Dan Berkson
Andres Bucci
Taylor Deupree
Emot. Joystick / Line 47
Feel the Beast
Renato Figoli
John Keys
Komonazmuk
Ed Laliq
Miskate
Peace Division
Alix Roy
Sinner DC
Someone Else
Urban Tribe

Audion: Noiser/Fred's Bells
Spectral

The incredibly resourceful Matthew Dear issues his latest Audion 12-inch, this one a two-track cocktail equally at home in the club or in your living room. “Noiser” begins with tiny sprites surveying acid-soaked terrain while a kick drum stomp morphs into a Latinized pulse. Dear stokes the fire with bubbling tendrils of synth figures that repeatedly take center stage and then return to the shadows; the tension grows and momentum builds so intensively, listeners brace themselves for an explosion that never comes. Instead, the piece settles into a locomotive chug that's eventually buried under synth flares. “Fred's Bells” is even more ear-catching, largely due to the billowing interjections of murmuring voices Dear spreads overtop his grooving house swing. The B-side's a little less frenetic but no less engrossing, especially when synth flares attack like darting cobras.

Despite the incredibly prolific production rate (“Noiser /Fred's Bells” is the seventh installment in the Audion series), Dear's material shows no drop in quality; judging by quality of the latest single, the outpouring seems only to have bolstered/refined his skills. What distinguishes these latest pieces is that they're not simply tracks that unfold linearly but compositions of mutating character which Dear artfully arranges into captivating wholes.

June 2007

This review also appears in Grooves.