From Alex Reynolds Sent Sat, Aug 8th 1998, 18:32
From Alex Reynolds Sent Sat, Aug 8th 1998, 18:32
Warning: For Advanced Music Critics Only! Gescom, _this_ (ska010) I've had this record for a few weeks and feel ready to put a little of it into words. I'm only going to discuss the track _viral rival_ (rmxd by Ae), as the other three tracks pale in comparison and are just not worth the effort. What starts as an aethereal and cheesy new-age track drops into a jazzy, noisy keyboard solo that repeats itself against a backbeat of varying tension, which collapses and brings the track down with it. For me, the solo really stole my attention and is worth a brief, oddly objective diversion: When I was a small child of the age of four or five, living in an industrial suburb of Pentwortham, outside of Preston, UK, I remember lots of different things: electrical transformers humming in our backyard; British Rail train tracks just down the hill, trains leaving every twenty minutes; Pakistani curry and chip shops; trips to the library to return overdue Noddy books. One memory that bubbled to the surface -- thanks to _viral rival_ -- is a cheaply-manufactured chunk of plastic that masqueraded as a electronic keyboard; it was called a "Concept 2000". My older brother and I were given this as a Xmas present one year, courtesy of my mum and dad -- and the Republic of Taiwan. The thing had 14 keys, each with red LEDs that would light up as you pressed them. It had a memory chip that stored preprogrammed songs and play them back on your cue, lighting the LEDs matching keys that would have been pressed -- had a human being bothered to get involved. One particular attribute of this toy was that it took eight AA batteries, which meant that we never got to play with this instrument much -- the batteries died as soon as you turned the thing on and played with it. Batteries back in the late 70s were not as cheap as they are now, especially eight of them. Pressing a key would issue forth a dying note, with the red LED going dim along with the frequency. The music sighing from this expiring box sounded exactly like the keyboard in _viral rival_: initially, the note was strong and clean, but dropped off in frequency right at the end. Even more creepy is that the sound chip on this thing was one-voice, meaning you couldn't get chords out of it -- sound comes out one button at a time. Exactly as in _viral rival_: notes might jump up and down an octave, but never are there any overlapping notes -- no chords. It's almost so transparent and subtle that it's fun. That's basically why the track is so appealing: basically a childish, almost drunk keyboardist at the helm of a piece of junk makes the track a lot of fun. That's it. A fun Gescom track. Mike + Rich vs. Booth + Brown. So go out and buy it -- or listen to your friend's copy. Yours, Alex Reynolds August 8, 1998