Midnight Sound

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This second Flanger outing sees the pairing of Uwe Schmidt (aka Atom Heart, Senor Coconut, Lassige Benthaus) and the ubiquitous, generally wonderful Bernd Friedmann (aka Nonplace Urban Field, Drome etc etc) embarking on another ironic journey into deep cyberjazzspace. It's a cooler, more melodic trip than its predecessor, though none the worse for that; as usual, Friedman sets up a casually complex, sinuous snare driven set of crisp latinesque fusion grooves over which Schmidt lays lush yet uncluttered rhodes chordings, rolling vibes, synth flurries and the occasional helping of guitar or digital click n' pop abstraction. The duo wear their irony on their sleeves - according to the liner notes, this is 'music that may soon make every kind of music we have known before seem obsolete'; or 'we played jazz and added the latin flavour wherever we could'. Generally rejecting solos in favour of sustained, subtle textural explorations, syncopated rhythmic commentary and the odd bit of macro level digital deconstruction, Flanger do manage to end up producing a music that's all their own. Like Friedmann's brilliant 'Con Ritmo' album, the duo blur the distinctions between played and placed musical material with some verve; almost unnoticeably, 'Bosco's Disposable Driver' gradually turns itself, Escher-like, inside out from a soft focus fusion workout into a crosshatched network of beeps, blips and pops and back again, to fade gently under what sounds like a solo extracted from a malfunctioning modem. Throughout the album, the constant shift of colourations conjured from a pretty limited set of sound sources is pretty seductive, while the grooves maintain the mix of sophistication and propulsion that characterises much of Friedmann's work; again his programming/playing seems (to me anyway) to be pretty much ahead of anyone else. Snares whirr, roll forwards, backwards, hi-hats tickle the brain (use headphones for best results). Despite all this apparent hyperactivity, Flanger are equally as effective when laying back - the closing 'Stepping out of my Dream' is an essay in restraint, with Schmidt dropping gently dissonant Rhodes meanderings over a soft cushion of plangent chords and brushed toms. Skip the ill advised, dodgy cover of Miles Davis's 'So What', and this album does exactly what it says on the sleeve; 'A most compelling invitation, engraved in Hi-Fi'.