From Tom Millar Sent Fri, Aug 6th 1999, 17:03
Big heap reviews today. Hope I can get through 'em all.. µ-Ziq: Royal Astronomy Astralwerks ASW 6275-2 Where's the drill n' bass freakouts? Where's the insistent distorto-beats? What? Half these tracks are beatless and the other half are two-step workouts the likes of which we last witnessed circa Urmur Bile days. Paradinas proves once again that his musicality prevails regardless of format. A lot of this realtes back to my favorites from Lunatic Harness- the tracks towards the end that got all gothic and pop-stringy, you know what I'm talking about, yeah, well, he refined the production process and here we have the logical extrapolation of the same ideas. The single, "Fear", is pretty damn good, even with the wishy-washy female vocals, and the two-steppers all kick as well. I do however wish there was some mo' nasty bass on this record, or at least some trashed-out drum machine beats from µ-ziq's days of yore. A good record, fits right in with the latest Plaid for sitting around having bizarre mood swings and occasionally getting up to wriggle rhythmically in the latest geek-dance fashion. Yippee. THIS RELEASE IS DSP-PLUGIN-ABUSE FREE. Squarepusher: Maximum Priest EP Nothing INTD 90997 The best out of the recent triad (shin triad?) of SQP releases. The fuckup fusion spooze sound has been refined, not to mention remixed, into a dramatically effective soundtrack vibe. This sounds like it would make a great alternative score for, well, about a million different thriller movies. Scary yet upbeat. Tense while evoking a pro-active stance in the direst of situations, this EP was made for high-tech criminals and the women who love them. Snap along to the Vibert remix- it's the solid gold SHZA-NIT. THIS RELEASE CONTAINS DSP-PLUGIN-ABUSE. DJ Craze: Crazee Musick Bomb Hip-Hop BOMB #2031 PROMO Like DJ Spooky, when DJ Spooky was good. Scratch chop delay/ sample sample scratch Chop/delay/repeat. Groovy hip-hop without lame guest MCs or too much reliance on purist turntablism, less plunderous than DJ Shadow, better grooves than about a million other wannabes. My kind of needle abuse. Definitely a checker-outter for those who check out this sort of thing, and even those like myself who normally don't. You don't even need to get smoked out to like this one (definite plus for the THC-allergic). THIS RELEASE IS DSP-PLUGIN-ABUSE FREE. Haujobb: ninetynine Metropolis met 113 My rivet-headed industrial pal handed me this the other day. He explained in no uncertain terms that it was my style and not his. Gets pretty dark here and there but no more than, say, FSOL, which is what this reminds me the most of. Short on the vox which normally make me shy away from "industrial" releases, and entirely lacking in cheesed-out distorted acid sounds so characteristic of the genre. All in all a pretty fine release- even the beats are decent. I listened to it straight through twice, for what it's worth. Lush, cosmic, and nothing to do with trance whatsoever. Like I said- the closest thing I can think of is FSOL, sonics-wise. Not as much sampler memory used on this release, but more smoothly put together than anything FSOL did. THIS RELEASE CONTAINS BARELY TRACEABLE AMOUNTS OF DSP-PLUGIN-ABUSE. The Remote Viewer: s/t 555 Recordings of Leeds 555CD8 Chunn-kee. Plodding beats to beat the best of the plodders, solemn chord buildups to match Autechre- basically Ae for dummies. That's pretty much it. If you've ever gotten too drunk to enjoy your favorite Ae records (Argh! Too much shit going on! Must.. stop!) then you might want to try this out. I can't really get any more descriptive than that- this is just like a remedial Ae record. Not to say it doesn't have its own good qualities, but it's just a slower thumpier Autechre sound. Maybe a little bit of David Kristian SFX in there as well, actually. Try before you buy. THIS RELEASE CONTAINS DSP-PLUGIN-ABUSE. V/A: Unknownwerks Astralwerks ASW 6257 Hey Everybody! West Coast Breaks and Orlando Breaks and NYC Breaks and Midwest Breaks and Mile High Breaks and ............. Who gives a shit. I'm glad I got this for free. just sit back, put on the biggest floppiest pants you own, stretch into your Liquid Sky top and act dumb for 74 minutes. Idiot beats from the latest in undiscovered idiots across the country with SP808 phrase samplers and all that other Roland Groove Approved SH-IT. My nuts. THIS RELEASE CONTAINS COPROPHAGY.