April 7, 2022 at 8:11 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Yoshinori Sunahara: Lovebeat – 20th Anniversary 2021 Optimized Re-Master 2xLP
A mid-career solo album from Yoshinori Sunahara (Denki Groove, Sweet Robots Against the Machine, Metafive) gets its first proper vinyl reissue, with remastered sound and a bit of bonus content. This is spacious, loungey downtempo IDM with exquisite sound design and very Kraftwerkian robot vocals guiding the songs. Tracks like “Balance” are calming and spa-worthy, but also have a bit of slowed-down machine funk to them. The title track might be the hit of sorts, but “Spiral Never Before” is surprisingly melancholy, and “Echo Endless Echo” is a brief indicator of what the artist’s music would be like if he explored more of his analog space synth influences. Some of the tracks at the end of the album seem to get scientific and political, with warnings of “controversy” and “uncontrollable activity”. The fourth side of the record contains a new, dubified remix of “Lovebeat”, plus a sequence of demos and loops that weren’t fleshed out into full songs, some of which might’ve actually been too exciting for this generally chilled-out album.
April 6, 2022 at 6:22 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Same Eyes: Desperate Ones LP
Same Eyes is an Ann Arbor-based duo consisting of Chad Pratt (Midwest Product, Hydropark, Morsel) and Alex Hughes.
Their second LP features several veterans of the area’s music scene (Fred Thomas, Dykehouse, Serge van der Voo), and was mastered by Warren Defever at Third Man Records in Detroit. The album is a faithful throwback to the New Romantic synth pop era. They don’t have a major label budget, but this is still widescreen, pop-minded music rather than basement minimal synth freakouts, with yelping vocals and starry melodies. The compact stomp of “Held High” is a standout, and “Pavillion” has an infectious electro-disco bassline. “Radio Moscow” is an adrenaline spike of discotheque drama, and “Recess” is breezy enough that you might overlook the fact that Hughes says “who bought your underwear” in the chorus. The more club-ready “Remnants of Fire” concludes the album, by which point I remembered that San Serac was a thing during the 2000s.
April 4, 2022 at 6:55 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Hal Galper Trio: Invitation to Openness
After last year’s release of a stellar live set by the 1977 Hal Galper Quintet, Origin now releases a 2008 date from a trio led by the pianist, this time including Tony Marino on bass and Billy Mintz on drums. Recorded live at a studio overlooking the Catskills for radio broadcast on WJFF, this set was casual and unforced, with no interference from engineer Dana Duke, who reportedly just pressed record and walked away during some of his sessions with the band. A mix of standards (Gershwin, Ellington, Parker) and originals, the band’s playing rumbles and scatters, sometimes darting across the tracks and tumbling over the melodies. The audience applause reinforces how spontaneous this all is, not that anyone would mistake this for a polished studio construction. Ellington’s “Take the Coltrane” seems like the most free-spirited track, until they rip through Charlie Parker’s “Constellation” at warp speed.
April 3, 2022 at 11:43 am | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Melissa Grey & David Morneau, Diego Vásquez: Dr Diego
Melissa Grey & David Morneau, masters of algorithmic and generative processes, have some fun on their
collaboration with clarinetist and dancer Diego Vásquez. The duo play handheld devices that most people would commonly regard as toys (a Merlin Music Machine and a Nintendo Game Boy), and they compose disco-chiptune rhythms which Vásquez navigates with his clarinet. “Fluorescence” is a 7-minute epic which bounces, bobs, and twirls, inhabiting a cyber-klezmer rave of its own. The tempo halves to near-dubstep pace at a couple points, and near the end it slowly accelerates back up in a rollercoaster rush. “Inforescence” sticks to a steadier disco beat, but the echo-enhanced clarinet notes dance around it in ecstatic bubbles.
April 3, 2022 at 11:25 am | Posted in The Answer Is In The Beat | Leave a comment
12:00 am Melissa Grey & David Morneau w/ Diego Vásquez ~ Inflorescence ~ Dr Diego (new) ~ Flower Cat ~ 2022
12:05 am Tommaso Moretti ~ Edge of a Decade ~ Inside Out (new) ~ Bace Records ~ 2022
12:11 am Sweet Trip ~ Aluralura ~ Seen/Unseen (new) ~ Darla ~ 2022
12:15 am Sweet Trip ~ Fish (Velora Mix 2022) ~ Halica: Bliss Out v.11 (Expanded Edition) (new) ~ Darla ~ 2022
12:21 am Kittin & The Hacker ~ Retrovision ~ Third Album (new) ~ Nobody’s Bizness ~ 2022
12:25 am Boy Harsher ~ The Ride Home ~ The Runner (Original Soundtrack) (new) ~ Nude Club ~ 2022
12:27 am Maylee Todd ~ Dream With You ~ Maloo (new) ~ Stones Throw ~ 2022
12:31 am µ-Ziq ~ Rave Whistle (Jungle Tekno Mix) ~ Goodbye (new) ~ Planet Mu ~ 2022
12:36 am DJ FLP (local) ~ Raver’s Spirit ~ Umbra (new) ~ Bandcamp ~ 2022
12:40 am CDR ~ Ifhwuhuver Deluxe (MEEBEE a.k.a KAZUHIRO ABO Remix) ~ Ifhwuhuver Deluxe (new) ~ Bandcamp ~ 2022
12:43 am Ruby My Dear ~ Essayer de rien faire ~ À Dada (new) ~ Blue Sub Records ~ 2022
12:47 am RXM Reality ~ Smack ~ Sick For You (new) ~ Hausu Mountain ~ 2022
12:50 am Pachyman ~ Towards The Mountain ~ El Sonido Nuevo de (new) ~ ATO ~ 2022
12:53 am Oceanator ~ Summer Rain ~ Nothing’s Ever Fine (new) ~ Polyvinyl ~ 2022
12:56 am Nilüfer Yanya ~ The Mystic ~ Painless (new) ~ ATO ~ 2022
1:01 am Ibibio Sound Machine ~ Almost Flying ~ Electricity (new) ~ Merge ~ 2022
1:05 am Same Eyes (local) ~ Such a Shame ~ Desperate Ones (new) ~ self-released ~ 2022
1:08 am Yoshinori Sunahara ~ The Center of Gravity ~ Lovebeat (2021 Optimized Re-Master) ~ Sony Music Direct (Japan) Inc. ~ 2001
1:15 am XV (local) ~ Mark E. Moon ~ Basement Tapes ~ Half a Million Records ~ 2020
1:18 am Marta Sanchez ~ The Eternal Stillness ~ SAAM (Spanish American Art Museum) (new) ~ Whirlwind Recordings ~ 2022
1:24 am Jeremy Pelt ~ Anthem for a Better Tomorrow ~ Black Lives – from Generation to Generation (new) ~ Jammin’ Colors ~ 2022
1:31 am Hal Galper Trio ~ Embraceable You ~ Invitation to Openness (new) ~ Origin ~ 2022
1:42 am Susana Baca ~ Sorongo ~ Palabras Urgentes ~ Real World ~ 2021
1:46 am Maleem Mahmoud Ghania with Pharoah Sanders ~ Boulandi Samawi ~ The Trance of Seven Colors ~ Axiom ~ 1994
April 2, 2022 at 12:06 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment
Tapani Rinne & Juha Mäki-Patola: Open
Finnish musicians Tapani Rinne and Juha Mäki-Patola conjure a vast, snowy landscape on their first collaboration. Rinne’s saxophone and clarinet playing is gently nuanced yet rich and expressive, and Mäki-Patola adds a comforting aura with his softly glowing layers of synths. The lapping waves of pieces like “Leave” make this album seem a little closer to ambient than jazz, yet there’s something warm and longing about Rinne’s saxophone playing that just doesn’t come across in most ambient music. It has to be said that the piano melodies in pieces like both parts of “Open” bring to mind last year’s Floating Points/Pharoah Sanders collaboration, although this one doesn’t have an orchestra elevating it to the heavens. Still, this is a soothing album to help you clear your mind.
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