The Answer Is In The Beat

Deepchord: 20 Electrostatic Soundfields (Soma, 2013)

November 29, 2013 at 7:31 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Detroit’s Rod Modell has been making spacious, aquatic ambient dub techno under aliases such as Deepchord, Echospace and cv313 for well over a decade. This album is another extended (nearly 80 minute) meditation, heavy on moist atmospherics and with less emphasis on beats than some of his other work. Many of the tracks are under 2 minutes, and function as transitional interludes, leading smaller, concentrated moments through the labyrinth of extended, repetitive rhythmic tracks. Tracks such as “Prayer Wheel” are steeped in hissing atmospherics without beats to guide them, while “De Wallen” and 10-minute epic “Aerosphere” are closer to the throbbing dub techno of Porter Ricks and the whole Basic Channel/Chain Reaction axis. “Oceanic” is appropriately wide and vast, but it doesn’t progress much, making it feel deceptively deep. “Fern”, on the other hand, builds with a lurching slo-mo beat and tinted dub effects, and a proper dub bassline. “Barcelona” has filtered street chatter, and is a bit reminiscent of Burial’s ambient interludes, but stretched out over 9 minutes. “Bronze” is similar, but it’s a 2 minute interlude and feels a bit more tense and worried, and it has a very brief soft IDM-ish beat segueing into the rain-fog of “Lotus Leaves”, which has some spare psych-dub echo ripples behind the rainy hissing. “Amsterdam Remnant 6” is a bit more of a straightforward percussive dub-techno track, heavy on the dub reggae flavor but with also a bit of glitchy delay. “Seaweed” is another swirly haze of a track, which seems to shift more the closer you listen. The final 3 tracks are full of rain, street sounds (laughter, dialogue, footsteps) and brittle moonlight, with closer “Rooftop” having the most close-miked rain crackle.