Various Artists

Dislocations

(Zonar/MDS)

Following on from the major success of Atone's debut album last year, the Sydney-based Zonar label has shifted directions with this 'nice price' double CD set of remixes on an experimental tip. Rather than simply release a compilation of remixes of already released stuff where the originals are known by the listener, Zonar has gotten all tricky and released a set of remixes of unreleased tracks so it works out more as a collaboration between artists than a straight remix project. Anyway, those conceptual complications aside, Dislocations starts out with the subterranean electro of Eyespine's remix of Brisbane's Low Key Operations followed by Shannon O'Neill's excellent remix of Size's hilarious 1000 Bambis which, as it develops, turns into 60s-psychedelic-sitar-based electro. Spooky sax floats on a sea of bleeps in Synchromesch's live remix of Alternahunk, Kazumichi Grime's Pinnae is a cavernous pit of echo reminiscent of Brian Lustmord's treated field recordings. Severed Heads drops a fantastic digidub mix of Atone's DemiGod, Hypnoblob's stabbing sharp robot electro breaks turn Size all futuristic, Flux's Tunnelvision builds from a spooky beginning into a Autechre-like soundscape, before CD one ends with Nik Nak's found sound train tracks as rhythms. CD two starts off with Size remixing Flux and then Wake Up And Listen do something really twisted with samples of White Lines turning it into White Spines . . . . Atone makes it all respectable again with a floaty low tempo mix of Hypnoblob's Pidgin. Mute Freak puts down two tracks of fucked up rhythms and weird sounds a bit like Herbert/Dr Rockit on speed and there's more from Low Key Operations, Eyespine and a great slow bleep track from 8 Bit & Bog. It all ends with what sounds like an Atari 2600 game remixing Something Stupid . . . .you'll know it when you hear it. All up an fantastic experimental electro compilation well up to the standard of more hyped overseas releases like those of Autechre's cult Skam label or Germany's Mille Plateaux - but all from our own backyard. Essential.

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Plaid

Not For Threes

(Warp/MDS)

The debut album on Warp from the ex-Black Dog crew Plaid. Having assisted on albums from vocalists Bjork and Nicollette, Plaid have honed their skills at making weirdo electronic pop music which doesn’t really sound like pop music should at all. From varispeed breaks of Headspin to the relentlessnesss of Extork, and the short pseudo-jungle of Forever with its Orbital progression, Not For Threes is brimming with excitement and diversity.

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Darren Verhagen

Soft Ash

(Dorobo/MDS)

Dark and eerie Melburnian, Darren Verhagen, has become world-renowned for his work under the guise of Shinjuku Thief/Filth and for his pioneering label Dorobo. A more ‘traditionally avant-garde’ release under his own name, Darren Verhagen flirts with ‘proper’ compositions that will win him the attention of people in classicla music circles who would otherwise ignore such ‘silliness’ as Shinjuku Theif purely on the basis of name. Anyway, this mini-album takes the theme of chemical poisoning and works seven compositions around such chemical disasters as Bhopal, Chernobyl, and the fogs of the Meuse Valley (1930) and London (1871). To sonic illustrate these incidents, Verhagen takes fragments of ‘found sound’ – radio cut ups, tape hiss and the like – and adds trumpets, strings and weird effects to create morbid dark soundscapes testament to the damage industrialisation has wrecked upon humankind. Not easy but rewarding listening.

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Purdy

A First In Everything EP

(Breakneck/Shock)

Purdy’s second vinyl outing since relocating to Sydney, this three track EP on Central Station sub label Breakneck, is less immediate in its appeal than its predecessor Sugar. The A side, A First In Everything, combines loping Ska beats and a nifty bassline with a sample that keeps it together, whilst the B-side’s Peace Whoop reminds me of Dr Rockit. The final track, Matchy Scratchbox is a duel between analogue squelches and sampled horns and xylophones. Well worth laying your hands on.

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Headrillaz

Coldharbour Rocks

(Sony V2/Pussyfoot)

Originally released on Howie B’s Pussyfoot label in mid-1997 and bringing together a series of 12"s that have been around since 1996, the Headrillaz’s Coldharbour Rocks is very much trip hop/big beat in a rock’n’roll vein. Interesting it has been released widely in the US which probably says more about how appealing it will be to ‘rock kids’ who just ‘wanna get out of it’ than it does to people who actually want something funky and slightly cerebral. Screaming Headz is all sampled rock riffs, Weird Planet rips off Meat Beat Manifesto circa 1990, Spacefuck is all too obvious in its Chemical Brothers’-style, Trepanning speeds up to jungle breaks but misses the plethora of fucked-up effects and stylistics that are making the latest drum’n’bass now interesting. If I Let You Live is probably the best track on the release with its more minimalistic construction with movie samples and cinematic construction, and Buggin’s & Breakin’ is also worth mentioning. All up a disappointing release that sounds too much like ‘rock’n’roll’, and at only 37 minutes in total you’d be better off tracking down the 12" with If I Let You Live or get it on one of the Pussyfoot compilations. That being said it will have large ‘crossover’ appeal and be big on US college radio where I’m sure it will find a willing audience and be heralded as ‘truly revolutionary’ just like every other ‘next big thing’.

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Soundlab

Simple Tones Of Rhythm

(Offworld/MDS)

Coming from Stephan Mallinder’s Perth-based label, Soundlab is a mellow breakbeat experience quite suited to our current pleasant summer. Pleasant is probably the best way to describe the whole thing actually because the smooth rolling basslines, tempered beats, floaty synths and samples that are drawn from relatively obvious sources don’t so much challenge or freak out the listener but sort of background themselves. Where bits and pieces fit into a drum’n’bass mould they are more akin to Alex Reece circa-1995 than the more innovative producers in the field of the last year, and thus work better in the local café or your lounge room especially with the lack of emphasis in the bottom-end. Tracks like Solitude, the funky Liquid Jive despite the IceT vocal, the highly percussive Blue Pencil and Rubber Funk stand out from the rest.

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Stereolab

Stereolab have been at it for years, taking off where Kevin Sheilds’ My Bloody Valentine project left, exploring the outer limits of mutant guitar pop. Dots & Loops is possibly the most accessible Stereolab album yet, combining the melodic vocals of Laetitia Sadier with lounge room guitar grooves. Subdued electronic courtesy of Mouse On Mars’ Jan St Werner subtly work into the mix on some tracks nicely bridging styles whilst elsewhere horns float in and out. Perfect comedown material for lazy Sunday afternoons in the age where everything else is rocking out from the Prodigy to Oasis.

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Squarepusher

Compiling Squarepusher’s earliest work from the Spymania label, Warp have come up trumps. Where Squarepusher has since sidled off into raucous abstraction, these 9 old tracks and 3 new ones, explore a fantastic jazz vibe whilst holding the weirdo high speed jungle rhythms of the more recent Squarepusher titles. Full of super-funky basslines and guitar licks, each of the twelve untitled tracks offer a witty and irreverent take on drum’n’bass which has been a hallmark of the Spymania label. Possibly the most interesting drum’n’bass release in a while outside of the darker reaches of techstep and the tracks are all over two years old! Don’t miss it.

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Various

Bolshi is a strange label. Backed by a major label but with the attitude of an indie, its releases are always well received. Translating from twelve inch to compilation is sometimes difficult for proponents of essentially upfront, sample-heavy, breakbeat tunes, but Donuts 2 has a good balance of uptempo and more laidback sounds. More eclectic and less ‘obvious’ than some of the other similar sounding labels, the twelve tracks drawn from the last few months and forthcoming Bolshi releases range from the scratched up Swedish hip hop cutups of Rasmus, to the B-grade guitar sounds of LHB and the crowd pleasing Laidback. On the downside the breaks used by most of the artists are very similar and the whole ‘style’ of groove varies little from track to track but for upfront sounds you could do a lot worse.

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High Pass Filter

Melbourne’s High Pass Filter are little known up here in Sydney although they recently toured the same nights as the Ninja Tune tour. One part Jah Wobble, another Bill Laswell, and another Adrian Sherwood, High Pass Filter combine disparate and futuristic elements of dub with live instrumentalists – guitars, drums, bass, horns, a turntable, and an ear for a crazy soundscape. Their debut album, hot on the heels of a stunning 7", is an amazing listening experience moving suddenly from laidback spatial dub grooves to a strange dub-funk with occasional abstract vocals reminiscent of early Headless Chickens stuff. Big bottom end production and sharp sound placement, Audio Forensic is a beautiful debut that comes highly recommended.

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Atari Teenage Riot

Shizuo vs Shizor

Christoph De Babalon

Deathfunk

These four titles on Alec Empire’s savage and distorted Digital Hardcore label all reflect different elements of Empire’s punk-techno philosophy. Anxious to inject an identifiable politics into the German techno scene Alec Empire has since the early 1990s struggled against the tide of trance and the re-emergence of neo-Nazi skinheads in the both the trance and hardcore scenes. Way back in 1991 he was releasing reggae tinged breakbeat records as a means of pushing race politics back in the face of dancers who just wanted to ‘get out of it’. Now in 1997 his pop band Atari Teenage Riot are the public face of his charge, themselves a multi-racial outfit, churning out another album of superfast gabber-meets-jungle beats over which lyrics are screamed and metal guitars wail. Their album The Future Of War is very straight-forward and simplistic, Hanin Elias’ vocals run with an anger directed at easy but crucial targets, and the whole thing reeks of a ‘fuck off’ attitude which is all good and well but its been done to death elsewhere – twenty years ago in fact. Most of the tracks have been released as Alec Empire 12"s on sister labels Force Inc, Mille Plateaux and Chrome without the vocals or guitars and they stand up much better in an instrumental format. Alec Empire’s budget priced sampler CD Funk Riot Beats in the guise of Deathfunk is a more coherent listening experience with distorted breakbeats crashing against almost painful industrial walls of sound. Entirely instrumental the harshness of the sounds and the raw energy of the breaks conjure up a gloomy future surpassing UK luminaries like Ed Rush, Nico and Trace whose bleak techstep tunes sound mild in comparison. Shizuo vs Shizor take a slightly different approach to Atari Teenage Riot backgrounding the vocals and allowing their crazy samples and distortion to take over. Their self-titled album walks a fine line between relatively accessible dark distrorted jungle complete with occasional Mentasm stabs (Braindead) and more obscure stuff like the totally electronic metal track Punks and the Nina Hagen-like New Kick. But it is Christoph De Babalon’s If You’re Into It I’m Out It that is the pick of the bunch. Similarly bleak the sonic vistas of De Babalon are far more subtle and textured than anything on theother three Digital Hardcore titles. Giving them a longer lasting effect than the kick-in-the-head ethics of Alec Empire and Shizuo vs Shizor If You’re Into It I’m Out Of It wavers between medium speed breaks and totally ambient industrial soundscapes where atonal sounds battle for supremacy. By turning the levels down below the distortion threshold De Babalon is able to allow space, air and clarity into his apocalyptic visions vastly increasing their potency. Don’t miss this one. Sure to get up the noses of almost everyone who hears the stuff Digital Hardcore is the perfect antidote to the on-going plethora of nice happy dance muzak – the happy hard, the nu-nrg, the neo-disco of the French house stuff; the pseudo-tribalism of psy-trance; and the well-produced hi-fi drum’n’bass that is emerging from the UK. Yellow Peril    

Various

Sydney label Thunk has been taking the world by storm ever since its first release and at last the CD compilation of the first few EPs has emerged. Drawing together the well-known tracks from Head Affect (Red Herring and Riot), Pocket (HiJack and Veda Rhyddum) and Earthlink (Bender) and then adding new tracks from pst-Infusion band Outfission and incestuous in-house remixes, 1800-Thunk is an excellent slice of the some of the most-heard quality locally produced music over the last year. Because the label has specialised in relatively mid-tempo beats all the tracks weave their magic both in the living room and on the dancefloor., although I still reckon that Head Affect should get Amii ‘Knock On Wood’ Stewart to do guest vocals on Red Herring . . . Even if you own some of the EPs already rush out and grab this piece of near-indestructible plastic. Excellent.

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Portishead

It is with a sceptical ear that I placed this album on the hifi – could Portishead shake off the ‘second album’ blues? Would it just be ‘more of the same’? Would it be another chart success? However after repeated listens it seems that Portishead have managed the unthinkable and actually produced an album that not only sounds pretty similar to Dummy but that this in fact makes it even better than Dummy. Beth Gibbons’ voice has undergone some changes and she shifts between sounding like a banshee and something akin to Shirley Bassey, but the greatest moments on the album lie in Geoff Barrow’s spectacular production. Utilising a darker and more brooding palette of sounds Barrow has looped spaghetti Western soundtracks and spy movie guitars over lumbering breakbeats, thrown in an impeccable selection of effects, and ended up with an exquisite melancholy complement to the vocals. Leaving aside the out-of-place opening track Cowboys, the album takes off with the James Bond-esque All Mine with horns and soaring vocals; Half Day Closing makes excellent use of stereo separation with the drums appearing almost outside of the mix and its refrain ‘in the days, the golden days, when everybody knew what they wanted, it ain’t here today’ muddied by dub-style delays and reverbs. Later in the album Mourning Air is brought to life by with a sampled trumpet, Seven Months and Elysium both breaking down to a brooding guitar, and the closing track, Western Eyes, is a masterpiece if only for the scratched in segment of ‘Hookers & Gin" which perfectly ends the album. Forget the distinctive vocals and angst-ridden lyrics, this album is the triumph of the producer and a dark, gloomy but highly rewarding journey into the sinister world of betrayal.

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General Electrik

Another excellent world-class EP of the funkiest bleep music from the latest signing to Sydney’s Gulp Communications label. Ranging from the electro sound of the title track to the filtered techno-house of Roboto Okuku to the almost cheesy Mark Paradinas (U-Ziq)-sounding and aptly-named Dinky this five track EP is full of much excitement. Don’t miss it and keep your eyes out for a live performance of General Electrik.

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Various

Melbourne’s IF? Label delivers another knockout collection of predominantly Victorian, predominantly four-on-the-floor beats. Standing out from quality minimal techno sounds are Artifical’s (Nicole of B(if)tek’s solo project) witty acid funk track Authority Over The Fish, the sci-fi soundscape-meets-breakbeat Nobody’s Driving from Little Nobody, and the muted drone’n’bass of Whatever Man’s Glass And A Half. Elsewhere TR-Storm and Sayaka drop some very spatial and well-produced acid techno tracks full of effects, filtering, and funky hi-hats proving that there might still be life and new sounds to be squeezed and tweaked out of the genre. Jammin unit contributes a raucous remix of Krang’s Acid Plastik and there is the inclusion of the Dirty House classic, Cinnamon’s Ohh Yeah both of which seem a little out of place amongst the more cinematic sounding other tracks. Stunning packaging and nicely intro-ed and outro-ed, the compilation as a whole is well worth the investment.

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Akotcha

Britain’s Pork label has given some excellent releases over the last few years exploring dubbed out mellow territories outside of the media spotlight that has been focussed on MoWax et al. Often fusing electronics with live instruments each Pork release, especially those from the prolific Fila Brazilia, is looked forward to with great interest. The latest is a from a new crew called Akotcha whose Sound Burger debut is immediately more melancholy than other Pork releases and at times is reminiscent of the soundscapes conjured up by DJ Krush. Slow breakbeats tick away under creeping loops in combinations that would suitably accompany a late night movie with the sound turned right down. An excellent release and well-worth sitting back on the couch and enjoying. Yellow Peril

Kid Loops

Timequake

(Filter/Shock)

After a few excellent five-star 12"s comes this full length release from Kid Loops. Breaking slightly away from the heavily bleep-influenced drum’n’bass of his other tracks, Timequake is both mellower and unfortunately on some tracks more formulaic. Whilst most of the album stays in a straight almost-ambient drum’n’bass mould, tracks such the fucked-ups slo-breaks of Wicked Loops, the electro of Kidtronix, more slow beats on I Can See What They ain’t Looking At and the Eric B & Rakim sampling Microphone Fiend make up the album’s highlights. The rest of the album whilst avoiding the washed-out ambience of LTJ Bukem et al, seems to hover around combining the sounds of early 1990s ambient dub (especially some of the releases from the Beyond label) with fast top-end breakbeats. At a time when drum’n’bass seems to be fracturing even more into a plethora of sub-genres and little niche markets, I guess my main qualm with the album as a whole is that its quite inoffensive and lacking the killer bass drops of some other recent drum’n’bass releases it wouldn’t be out of place as coffee shop wallpaper.

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Various

Low Life Extensions

(EyeQ/Warners)

Opening with the magical Wait For A Day by Japan’s Susumu Yokota things move increasingly into the realm of repetitive and bland minimalist techno and hosue loops. Hacienda’s Plusch and Braincell’s So Far So Good are turned into disco house loop-a-thons by Jeremiah and Roy Davis Jnr respectively, Der Dritte Raum, Jiri Ceiver, Hardfloor and Earth Nation are all transformed via remix into minimalisttechno excursions that really need to be mixed over the top of other tracks to work properly. Given that Yokota’s Wait for A Day is available on that other Harthouse compilation, Good Records, at present, there is little to recommend here except to a DJ who will use them as mixing tools but then they should already have most of these tracks on 12".

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Various Artists

Backlash

(Recycle Or Die/Creative Vibes)

Sven Vath’s attempt to create a quality beatless ambient label five years ago resulted in the Harthouse offshoot Recycle Or Die. Remarkable for their designer-digipacks each put together by a different German contemporary artist, the Recycle or Die albums quickly became collector’s items despite the sometime musical lapses into mediocrity. Now, in 1997, comes the latest Recycle Or Die – a compilation of remixes called Backlash. If you’ve been following the UK press then you’d know that ambient techno died in ’94 or ’95 when drum’n’bass and trip hop arrived en masse, and its obvious that the folks at Recycle or Die have been listening because this shift is reflected in this latest work - the beats are back. Unfortunately it doesn’t quite work. Stevie B-Zet and Ralf Hildenbeutel (Sven Vath’s main composing partner) both spice up their melancholy ambient tracks with breakbeats of varying speeds but fit the more stale LTJ Bukem-mould than the more innovative works of for example, Amon Tobin. MIR, manages better fusing a guitar riff with flanging beats on From Afar but again ends up sounding cliched on his cover version of The Church’s Under the Milkyway which includes some rather stunted vocals from Noelle whoever she is. Neither sufficently innovative to be challenging listening music, nor classy enough to suit the moods of the greater early moments of the Recycle Or Die label, Backlash falls safely in the middle ground which is not necessarily a good thing.

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Various Artists

Good Records

(Harthouse UK/Creative Vibes)

Sven Vath's legendary Harthouse operation has finished forever only to be reborn in England as Harthouse UK with this great compilation supposedly defining the 'new direction' of the label. Where Harthouse became synonymous with the quality end of the German trance sound in the early 1990s, the last tow years have been particularly hard on the label especially as its contemporaries such as R&S have openly embraced the new sounds that have, at last, conquered the Germanic trance sound, particularly the re-emergence of breakbeats both slow as in trip hop and fast as in drum'n'bass. Apparently, if you read the UK press, 'soul' and 'funk' have returned to the music which was supposedly non-existent in the Teutonic trance sound. To this end Harthouse UK have compiled Good Records perhaps as a way of sticking up two fingers that shit. A range of tracks culled from releases since 1995, Good Records has Frank de Wulf's Drums In A Grip remixed by Wax Doctor, Planet Jazz's cute Monster, Freddy Fresh vs Bassbin Twins' Chupacabbra, as well as chunky techno from Alter Ego vs David Holmes, Braincell and the smooth groove of Derrick Carter's take on Yokota's One Way. A good compilation which goes a long way to redefining what Harthouse is now about.

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Two Lone Swordsmen

Stockwell Steppas

(Emissions/Creative Vibes)

Although not really an album, more of a mini-album actually, this nine tracker from Andy Weatherall's post-Sabres outfit Two Lone Swordsmen is worth every bit of its mid-price price. Mixing a very urban ambient sound with some exquisite cello-driven house and even drum'n'bass, Stockwell Steppas is like a journey through the inner city Estates that you see on The Bill. Rather than capture the density, bleakness and grey skies with aggressive hip hop (like in La Haine) Weatherall's approach is more subtle and ultimately more effective and authentic. For those that think that 'gritty urban realism' means a harrowing listening experience then such preconceptions will be shattered by the beauty of the mournful cello which leaps out of Spin Desire, and the mutating beats of Spraycan Attack. Excellent.

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Scanner

Delivery

(Earache/Shock)

Tapping analogue mobile phone calls is what has made a name for Robin Rimbaud's Scanner project and as the Western world begins to leave this technology behind in favour of digital phones Scanner's work, as evidenced by his recent Australian tour, is becoming more and more dubious. His Sydney show, rather than illuminating how "public" our supposedly private communications can be, was more an exercise in allowing a middle-class, well-educated art audience to spy on predominantly low-income, less-educated, working class analogue phone users. Some may argue that this is part of the point of his sound art, but musically his work has, apart from his Spore album, been rather dull and only made remarkable by his trademark 'sampling'. Now up to album number seven (maybe more if you count the numerous 'collaborations'), Rimbaud has toned down the emphasis on electronic evesdropping and has explored some more beat driven soundscapes playing with breakbeats and deep basslines. The solitary standout track, Throne Of Hives, is like the needle in the haystack pulsating with superfunk. Other than that its all moody and unremarkable, and you'd be better spending your money on his earlier Spore album on the New Electronica label.

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The Grey Area

The Grey Area

(PsyHarmonics)

Is this the product of five people with the mind of one, or one person with the minds of five, or some other permutation? The obviously pseudonymic Randy Coward, Chuck Manoeuvres, Grecian Ernie, Bogdan Jedrychowski, and Hugh Janus go to work as The Grey Area tackling what seems to be very unfamiliar terrain for PsyHarmonics. Apparently, PsyHarmonics, after hearing The Grey Area playing some freaky 'doof' stuff live signed them up for an album only to be given this at the eleventh hour, and I must say I am pleased that this happened. Strange surreal lyrics, slow funky beats, and electronica all make for a weird and enjoyable listening experience whether chemically enhanced or not and whether they get pigeonholed as trip hop or electronic funk or, perish the thought, industrial (perhaps because of their lyrical resemblance to Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV), make sure you go and have a listen. Soon there will be a CD single featuring the CD-Rom multimedia component that was supposed to be packaged as an extra CD with the album but never ended up being pressed. Until then have a look at their web page located at the highly chaotic and often hilarious Chaos site - www.chaos.org.au - which also has information on the Mu-Mesons, Viral TX and Nuns With Guns. That should tell you something.

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Various Artists

The Uncertain Future - The 4^th Barramundi Sampler

(Antler-Subway/Creative Vibes)

It could be a scene out of one of those American college movies - "ambient? That's sooo '93) . . . The latest compilation from the K-Tel of European ambient dub promises all sorts of cultural misappropriation and New Age guff from a whole bunch of unknowns with names like Diamond Tears, Triple Moon, Psychic Celebration and, may favourite, Boats Of Opium (we wish!). Unfortunately it turns out to be, in fact, very respectable with a host of strange subterranean sounds only infrequently punctuated by sickly melodies which aren't that bad either and minimal pan flutes or whale noises (which were on the previous 3 in the same series). Breakbeats get a look in on the subaquatic K-Lab track Intrude and Hydra's electrostatic horse-whinnying The Joy Of The World , Dusty Town's Weird Science is suitably spooky, Boats Of Opium builds nicely from Hellraiser-like beginnings, Karma De La Luna, the stalwarts of the Barramundi series do good again and the 'epic' factor is certainly present in many of tracks with only a few of the 18 tracks being under 5 minutes long. As far as 1990s ambient dub goes, the benchmarks lie in Pete Namlook's Air I and Air II projects, some of the other Fax Records projects, the first three Beyond compilations, the early Emit releases The Orb, Bill Laswell's Divination series and Brian Lustmord's location recordings, against which this compilation rather pales in comparison. Nonetheless there ARE some great tracks here and for 2CDs worth of listening its good value but equally there are some rather cliched moments too. On the downside too is the fact that your parents probably won't complain too much if they spring you playing this on their stereo - never a good sign!

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Amon Tobin

Bricolage

(Ninja Tune/Creative Vibes)

Bricolage? Isn't that what those 1960s Parisiens, the Situationists, were talking about and academics reckon that the punks were doing when they wore ripped-up suits and saftey pins? Maybe so, or was that detournement? Perhaps you should visit the Black Rose Anarchist Bookshop in Newtown to find out more (subtle plug) . . . . anyway back to the album. Amon Tobin, not content with his excellent album under the guise of Cujo on Ninebar Records last year, returns with another full-length release on Ninja Tune. Where his Cujo project seems to sound more 'cinematic' - the awesome Ry Cooder-sampling Paris Streatham (!?!) a case in point - his Amon Tobin personality blends these tendencies with more of a jazz feeling but not 'jazz' in that awful obvious 'jazzy jungle' way. True to the recent Ninja Tune releases, the emphasis is on fucked-up breakbeats and they are in no short supply here and when combined with strange time signatures the effect outdoes the more-hyped Squarepusher et al. If I call it jungle or drum'n'bass then everyone will rush out and listen, but the beats never quite do what you predict - have a listen to Chomp Samba, Bitter & Twisted and One Day In My Garden - and then also most of the tracks are quite low in tempo. This being said, you should rush out and grab this just because it is so absolutely engrossing, atmospheric, creative, without ever being alienating. Beautiful and one of my records of the month.

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Archive

Londinium

(Island/Mercury)

The musical opposition of male/rhythm and female/melody is inscribed heavily into our Western pop culture and in the style of Massive Attack comes Archive's album Londinium. Combining classical instruments and folk melodies with raps and bass heavy slowed beats always has the potential for disaster but Archive manage to pull it off quite well. Female vocalist Roya occasionally veers into Enya-ish territory and rapper Rosko delivers the occasional cliched rhyme, but Archive's appeal lies more in what the juxtaposition of hard, quick and gruff rapped male voice with the slow soulful female melodies sound like over the MoWax beats and strings rather than what is actually being said. Vocals have become increasingly unimportant in any half-interesting music genres since the acid house/techno explosion and now seem to colour tracks rather than be their focus, but back to the review . . . The instrumental ManMade, the single Londinium, and the Portishead-like Last Five stand out slightly above the rest. Nothing new or surprising or ground-breaking but as an album Londinum is well worth checking out simply because it sound good, oh, and it'll probably become a dinner-party and wine-bar favourite like Portishead and Massive Attack.

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Various Artists

Beatz Work Volume One

(Organarchy Sound Systems/Creative Vibes)

This compilation is a little like the embodiment of the Vibe Tribe with a healthy dose of North Coast NSW thrown in for good measure. It is rough, rugged, and, comparative to most other local compilations decidedly lo-fi in sound and also in design. But then, like the Kooky Compilation, it is quite obviously a work of love - for a spirit of music and life, and for the communities that have sprung up around this spirit. Organarchy Sound Systems is the label of one of the original (and still every now and again) members of Non Bosse Posse, Kol Dimond who now lives up on the North Coast. Kol has drawn together tracks from the people he has worked with over the years including the most of the rest of the original NBP crew - Ian Andrews who contributes as Hypnoblob, Pete Strong as Solar Co-Ordinates, Je Kaelin as Disconitz. There are also tracks from Ju Ju space Jazz, DJ Manson in a collaboration with Daniel of Ju Ju, Jay Bryan, D*Ranger, Sistas Of The Underground's Greta as Adrenalentil, and Ray Castle. With liner notes by Pete Strong and John Jacobs (also of NBP, Video Subvertigo and now Sydney's Filter) the package and album set down on record the ideas and ethos of the Vibe Tribe and its offspring which was so instrumental in injecting crunchy techno sounds into the politics of punk and the politics of punk into the local techno scene. Appropriately associating the label and the work of the artists with MACOS (Musicians Against The Copyrighting Of Samples), the CD is both a reflection of, and the product of a particular time, a particular community of people, a series of parties that will be remembered long into the future, and at the same time a beacon that should attract much new attention. For those who did not take part or attend the Vibe Tribe's events then don't go expecting a 'finished work' when you listen - these tracks are the product of an environment that is about making spontaneous music in conjunction with the listener, and such it needs to and deserves to be played through an old PA system and a noisy mixer. But in the meantime listen to it in Sydney Park on your dodgy fluoro ghetto blaster but watch out for the coppers!

Yellow Peril

Chemical Brothers

Dig Your Own Hole

(Virgin)

Let's get this out of the way quickly and say that this will be huge - it will go Top 10 and all the rest - if we're lucky we might even get a live tour. This being said Dig Your Own Hole is slightly disappointing. Full of those standard breaks that now have been even called 'chemical beats' the album is sure to bring that particular upfront sound to commercial radio and the all-important 'high-rotation' slots. Containing the current single Block Rockin' Beats, and its recent predecessors Setting Sun (with that twat Noel Gallagher), and the excellent Get Up On It Like This (albeit a 2 minute edited version), the most exciting moments on the latter half of the album with the tripped-out filtered house of It Doesn't Matter, the electrofunk of Lost In The K-Hole, the mellow indie pop of Where Do I Begin with vocalist Beth Orton and the 9 minute closer, Private Psychedelic Reel which is straight from the 60s (or a Madchester anthem come too late). Even these tracks are reasonably predictable in their use of sound and samples - and there is a surprising comfort in this predictability. Very likely people will think and have thought that this album is more diverse than its predecessor Exit Planet Dust but I'd bet that they are approaching it from a rock mind-set - the guitar samples, and the overall tone is far more 'rocky' than Exit Planet Dust. In many ways its not surprising that this will be huge because it has all the elements of those 'great rock albums', and for me this is its major flaw for rather than heralding the emergence of underground dance music into the mainstream, it is almost the other way around.

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Various Artists

Concrete - Structurally Sound

(DeConstruction/BMG)

Recognised for pushing a less commercial sound than DeConstruction, Concrete's releases lie somewhere between the Chemical Brothers/Wall Of Sound and Adelaide's Dirty House label and this compilation pulls together some of the finer moments. Opening with the twisted funky house groove of Aleem's Filtri Organi sourced in France it quickly moves into the electro mayhem of Metro LA's To A Nation Rockin' before the Dub Pistols and Death In Vegas drop some Wall of Sound style acid funk on There's Going To Be Riot and Rocco. Then its back into a funky house sound with another track from Metro LA and the swinging Sure Is Pure remix of Basco's The Beat Is Over, Dave Clarke remixes Death In Vegas' Rocco into a moody breakbeat piece and the album closes with Wall Of Sound's Ceasefire spicing and bleeping up the Dub Pistols. Ten tracks of upfront mindless amusement sure to rock any party, and thankfully on local release.

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Daybehaviour

Adored

(North Of No South/Shock)

To an already strong field of electro-pop comes Swedish group Daybehaviour. Their debut album, Adored, is, if anything, a little too derivative of others in the field. This becomes particularly apparent towards the middle of the twelve track album. Il Sogno comes on like a mournful Portishead number; Clown reminds me of The Golden Palominos; Movie, strangely enough sounds almost exactly like St Etienne's Pale Movie; and Momentary Laughter and Hello sound like Single Gun Theory. It is all pleasant enough stuff, and the two tracks sung entirely in Italian - Il Sogno and Treno Notturno, offer a break from the rather contrite lyrics (but aren't ALL pop and rock lyrics contrite?) allowing the listener to concentrate more on the texture and mood of the lyrics, Roland Barthes "grain of the voice", rather than what the individual words mean, and end up, not surprisingly end up being the highlights of the album.

Adored should probably be viewed as an addition rather than an alternative to what should be essential purchases in the field of electro-pop namely St Etienne's Foxbase Alpha and So Tough albums and Single Gun Theory's Like Stars In My Hands. Lacking the dub sensibilities and classy production values of the former and the lure of exotica that the latter brings, Daybehaviour fall somewhat flat in the demanding post-techno electro-pop world.

Yellow Peril

Various Artists

Dope On Plastic 4

(React/MDS)

Hideously good value at single CD price, this double pack should really be called "upfront party toons" as that is a more accurate indication of where it lies and how long it will last you. More throwaway but also more enjoyable than the previous three volumes in the series, Dope On Plastic 4 packs in the big tracks with only a few fillers and is even available in pre-mixed party format. For your money you get Killer Moses' analogue funk Insomniac that just builds and builds, Raw Deal's B-Grade horror of Return Of The Rebel, Hidden Chipsters' The Herb, Monkey Mafia's scratched up, remixed, Busta Rhymes-sampling ragga-hop Work Mi Body, DJ Kool's totally crap Let Me Clear My Throat that packs in as many DJ-ego boosting cliches as possible, Awesome III's rockin' Ahooga, DJ Eclipse's aptly named Dedication that samples and strings together almost every well-known late-80s hip hop track (before hip hop became colonised by stories of guns and crack), a funky Bouncy Lady from Danny Hilbrid, Dubdog's bangin' acid-electro Confusion that starts like LFO's killer Tied Up before turning on the squelch box before ending on a dancefloor friendly combo of Cut'n"Paste's Watch me Rollin', Scope's For Those Who Like To Groove, David Holmes and London Funk Allstars. Released in the UK at a time when people are starting to thaw out after a cold Winter, it is the opposite way around for us in the Southern Hemisphere but will certainly keep the chill out of the end-of-summer parties currently doing the rounds. If its "party music" you are after head for this instead of the multitude of "party anthems" albums released just to cash in on Mardi Gras.

Yellow Peril

Various

Ministry of Sound - One Half Of A Whole Decade

(MOS/MDS)

Super-clubs or stupor-clubs? Ministry Of Sound alongside Cream must rank amongst the worst excesses of residual Eighties entrepreneurialism and for some strange reason the British have fallen for it. This lapse of reason might be attributable to the many years under the iron fist of Thatcher, but for some reason I have a sneaking suspicion that Thatcher would have approved whole-heartedly of this gross capitalistic enterprise. The Criminal Justice Bill was designed to force everyone back into the clubs and then suddenly the UK music press heralds the "super-clubs" - coincidence? I think not. Someone has connections in the Parliament.

This lavishly packaged compilation- three ceedee's long featuring all the "big names" - will doubtless sell millions, but is possibly the worst example of the mix-cd genre I have yet chanced upon. CJ Mackintosh and Todd Terry uninspiringly mix some very uninspiring garage, whilst Seb (no relation to me) Fontaine and Jon Pleased Wimmin fail to exhibit mixing skills any better than my neighbour's little brother, fading tracks out and relying upon the "anthems" to hold it together, and even LTJ Bukem and his monotone MC Conrad turn their mix-cd into a shameless promotion for their own label (what? Is there no other drum'n'bass apart from that which is on Good Looking?). Of course you get a little glossy booklet outlining the star deejays which read like a major label press release, and an order form for Ministry Of Sound merchandise.

Ministry Of Sound and Cream may be touting themselves as the future of the dance music 'industry' but fuck that. I want no part of their revolting capitalist excesses and neither should you. As for the "artists' involved in this exercise in money-wasting, boycott their products - yes even LTJ Bukem. Money may buy you friends and nice packaging, but the insides suck. Beware of Australian equivalents - don't buy back your memories, remember them.

Yellow Peril

Various Artists

The 2^nd Orbit

(P Rhythm/Colossal)

GIST: Experimental minimalist techno that some people might also called 'hard house' straight outta Stockholm's P-Rhythm label. 808's, 909's and a whole host of other analogue machines but very little, if any, squelching acid.

BIG TRACKS: No well known anthems here just solid bangin' sounds including three from Cari 'Braincell' Lekebusch including the excellent Enough which is all distorted freaked out drums a bit like LFO's Tied Up; and the understated 'never quite breaking" breakbeats of Genecom's Sunchase.

VERDICT: A trainspotter's delight with a solid line up but little variety for the rest of us. Few of the tracks have 'instant appeal' which is, perhaps, a good thing so steer well clear if it's a 'party album' you are after, on the other hand if you are looking for some minimalist experimental 4/4 techno then look no further.

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GIST: Twenty-one exclusive drum'n'bass cuts spread over 2 CDs from the newcomers in the scene ranging from the ambient and jazzy to the hardstepping and techstepping varieties complemented by a informative but poorly-laidout 120 page booklet full of interviews and other guff.

BIG TRACKS: Kid Loops' mellow The Comeback, T-Power, Aphrodite & Mickey Finn's jump-up Bass Of The Tramp, Elementz Of Noize's dark and scary Ends Justify Means and old 'ardcore crew Geneside II's Just As Rougher.

VERDICT: A top collection of interesting movements in drum'n'bass which despite devolving into cocktail muzak especially in the middle of CD 2 (Subject 13, Cleveland Watkiss, Endemic void, Justice) the overall variety and booklet make this a good document of the current movers and shakers in d&b. Because they are all exclusive tracks, too, there is no chance of 'doubling up' with other compilations.

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