Jez Wells

YosepH by Luke Vibert (WARPCD112P)

Since genius has become an over used and pretty much meaningless word, I’ll limit myself to describing Luke Vibert as a very, very, very talented person. At no time since the Prince of the 80s and early 90s has there been someone so prolific and talented making so many records. Since his first long player, Phat Lab Nightmare, he’s been a hard man to keep up with but the snappy, groovy slip-slap of Throbbing Pouch (and it’s ‘bonus’ EP At Amos) as Wagon Christ and the weird mayhem of Drum ‘n Bass for Papa as Plug are all time classics that every fan of dance and electronic music should have. Big Soup (as Luke Vibert), Tally Ho (as Wagon Christ) and Stop the Panic (with BJ Cole) should be next on the list if you have those and there’s more, all of it good.

And if he’s not quite the star that Aphex Twin is (and he deserves to be) then he’s recognised by a lot of great labels as a talent worth investing in: Rising High, Mo’ Wax, Blue Planet and now Warp are just a few that have asked him to supply the goods. Although this is his most backward looking and least obviously innovative album that he’s produced to date it doesn’t disappoint. This is a celebration of acid and isn’t just pointless pastiche. It tips its hat to the past whilst strutting and bobbing confidently into the future. And that future’s bright, and that future’s definitely Vibert.

During his acid DJ set on the last night of Big Chill Naxos 2001 I was struck by two thoughts: “Great, I haven’t heard stuff like this for years” and “erm, dance production improved a lot since this stuff was released”. It’s as if he read my mind: Yoseph is a celebration and reinvention of the hypnotic, bumpy, jacking squelch that was Acid. That groove and vibe but through a lovely pair of Luke Vibert 2003 rose tinted production glasses. I Love Acid, the centre point of this collection and a worthy homage, really ought to be the title of the whole album but I’m told that the pH of Yoseph is the link. Sadly the track Yoseph, is one of the few places were Vibert drifts into dull noodling, but a sample from that Radio 2 jingle from the seventies (stare-eee-ohhhh) at the end puts the smile back on your face and makes you forgive and forget.

There are nods to Kraftwerk’s Computer World LP (released in 1981 and arguably at least half the blueprint for Acid House and a million other things) - NokTup bears a strong resemblance to Home Computer and Countdown quotes directly from Numbers. And looking further back Ambalek wouldn’t sound out of place in Walter Carlos’ score for A Clockwork Orange. Elsewhere it’s pure Vibert though: Slowfast is from the Plug part of his brain and Freaktime Baby throbs like Wagon Christ’s pouch.

Not his best collection of tunes, but still streets ahead of most other things you’ll hear this year. Highly recommended.

More or Less Mono

One of the great things about writing reviews of new music, particularly electronic music, is that every now and again you get to dream up bizarre new genre titles. "Glitchgazing" is my effort for this year and, although I'm not sure it'll catch on, it seems to fit the growing number of releases fusing the sound sculpturing techniques of electronic composers with the more traditional sounds of guitar and vocal pop that have come my way recently.

It's certainly a word that suits this release from Dub Tractor (one Anders Remmer from Copenhagen). From the opening track, A Second, where the gentle clicking of geiger counter percussion scurries along the top of sustained guitar notes we can hear the marriage of introspective rock and microscopic electronica. The second track, I Don't Care, has an understated but very catchy vocal accompanied by lazily groovy guitar licks and the click and clatter of tiny drums. The alternation, between the first two tracks, of deeper instrumentals and lighter pop pieces is typical of the whole album. Don't be put off by the title, I'm happy to confirm that all of the tracks, including the title track, are in stereo although often it is just the gentle swaying of a guitar tremolo that wafts the sound between the speakers whilst everything else remains rooted to the spot in the centre.

Although the textures are always interesting the music occasionally treads water a little bit too much and I find myself waiting for developments that never come - Leaning and Pep don't really do enough to hold my attention but Wait strikes just the right balance between the instant charm of pop and the subtleties of Remmer's electronic orchestrations. The pace picks up for E47, which is a chatter of syncopated drums and melody, and More or Less Mono, with it's smoothly snaking groove and straight ahead guitar riff - these two tracks are certainly a high point of the album.

50 Hz Guitaris a deep and dubby number featuring acoustic guitar and a swirling mist of noises and percussion but again, although the textures can be breathtaking, otherwise the point is laboured and we end up in a cul-de-sac with music that is going nowhere slowly. Hum (Part 4) which closes the album is all distant guitars and muffled vocals and sums up best the 'shy' pop sound that crops up between instrumentals on this album.

This is not epic music nor is it overly serious (well not for too long anyway) and the wonderful instrumentation and production washes over you leaving a residue of occasional hooks and grooves to remember the experience by. Overall an engaging and worthwhile 38 minutes with some great moments, although it's time probably best spent during the early hours of dawn.

Pick Up

Bonobo's 2001 album on Tru Thoughts, Animal Magic, was one of the musical highlights of that year for me. Simon Green managed the conjurer's trick of creating organic music from looped samples in which none of the hard architectural edges that often characterise this kind of music and give it its 'tracky', 'bolted-together' feel were to be found. The raw material may have been bits and pieces from an audio wreckers yard but the Bonobo sound was put together in such a way that the whole was much, much greater than the sum of its parts. It seemed as if the individual samples had been reanimated and had jostled themselves together into new, snug fitting pieces of music that they had always been somehow destined for. And there were some fantastic hooks too - nearly every track had some motif or other that lodged itself in a nook in my brain and stayed there constantly wafting memories of it back at me.

His latest single Pick Up/Behind the Light, my first glimpse of his new material since he moved to Ninja Tune initially suggests that little has changed. This is groovy, easy going music that shimmies through a fragrant blend of weird and wonderful sounds ranging from the cooing of a female choir to the guitar-like Japanese shamisen. Pick Up features an upfront, brisk drum part accompanied by some extended flute noodles whilst Behind the Light is more homogenised with many different sounds taking the limelight at different places. The feel is laid back and dramatic in turns. Although the music in the second track is more interesting than the first both contain many of the hallmarks of style and craftsmanship recognisable in Animal Magic and they are a pleasure to listen to. However, unlike his earlier work these pieces are quite forgettable once they have finished - they leave little trace of memory other than the faint recall that it was a pleasant experience and I had no desperate desire to hear them again. Whilst the rich Bonobo sound has been retained and he sounds as competent as ever, some of his old charm seems to have worn away.