CD Album Recommendations August 2015

Review: It's been some six years since Hun Choi made his debut on William Burnett's WT Records imprint. In that time, he's proved incredibly hard to pin down. This debut album for Rush Hour seems designed to continue that trend, offering a series of warm, melodious and curiously Balearic cuts that defy easy categorization. Sure, there are dancefloor-focused moments - see the cacophonous, Detroit-influenced hustle of "Error of the Average", the deep acid madness of "Silent Sensations" and the classic deep house bounce of "Desire" - but also a range of downtempo and ambient jams that arguably impress more. Of these, it's "The World" - a humid exercise in tropical drums, twittering flutes and looped vocal samples - and the sublime, string-laden "Bruises" that really stand out.

Review: Some critics have complained that the Chemical Brothers' Born In The Echoes - their first studio album in five years - is not distinctive enough from their previous work. Arguably, this is actually the album's greatest strength. Sure, it sounds like it was cut from the same cloth as, say, 1999's Surrender or 2001's Come With Us, but is that such a bad thing? The beats are bold, the electronics trippy, the acid lines intense, and the rock influences wild and unwieldy. Like those sets, there are plenty of guest vocalists - Q-Tip and Beck being the most notable stars - and moments that recall their greatest work (see the "Let Forever Be" style dancefloor psychedelia of "I'll See You There").

Review: Undoubtedly one of the most prolific Dutch artists currently working in electronic music, Boris Bunnik has put out a staggering amount of records in the eight years since he first surfaced. Presentism is his fourth full length under the familiar Conforce name and flips the script a little. Recorded following his recent move to Rotterdam, it sees the veteran Dutch artist blending glacial electronics, crystal clear melodies and spacey chords with elements of ambient, classic IDM and Detroit techno. As a result, it's a far more picturesque and set than his three previous albums, with an emphasis on mood and melody previously buried beneath industrial textures and razor-sharp rhythms. It could well be his best set to date, and that's saying something.

Review: There's a definite "odds and ends" feel to Moda Black's Little Black Book series, which is designed to sit somewhere between an album, a remix album and a compilation. The second volume in the series comes from Groove Armada, and boasts eight previously unheard dancefloor-focused cuts from the long-serving duo, a bunch of remixes by other artists of their work, a tasty collaboration with Extra Curricular and a few curiosities (see their house rework of Rockers Revenge's "Walking on Sunshine"). Musically, it largely sticks to a main room/Ibiza-friendly powder house flex (albeit with a veritable smorgasbord of vintage house and garage influences). As for the remixes, they're largely impressive, with Pillowtalk, Chaim, Huxley and The Emperor Machine all delivering killer blows.

Review: Australian combo Tama Impala has always been hard to pin down, with their two studio albums to date displaying a keen desire to capture a trippy, psychedelic vibe, whilst refusing to settle on one easy-to-categorize sound. Currents, their fourth album, continues this trend, toning down some of the psychedelic rock elements in favour of nods to blue-eyed soul, woozy dream-pop, cheery summery pop (see the radio hit in waiting "The Less I Know The Better"), and even the head-nodding rhythms of hip hop (which, incidentally, prove the perfect backing for the morphine pop wooziness of "Past Life"). It's a blend that re-casts the band as baked, inter-dimensional travellers with a neat line in enveloping, sun-kissed downtempo pop.

Review: The legendary John Beltran returns with another masterpiece on Delsin. A master producer whose career has spanned everything from Detroit techno and electronica to Latin music, his attempt at ambient is equally well executed. The breath taking "Music for Machines" with its droning mechanical soundscape and beautiful transcending strings. "Orange Background" and its factory sounds accompanying a repetitive resonance. Beltran's emotive and sombre piano sound plays a large part and he does it tremendously on "Many Moments to Come" as well as the memorable "Love Suspended". All in all a brilliant effort and contender for one of the finest albums this year.

Review: For his last outing on Hospital Productions, Nine Inch Nails collaborator Alessandro Cortini utilized just two pieces of equipment: a Roland MC-202 and a delay pedal. For this follow-up, he's expanded his toolbox a little, supplementing those hardware pieces with two further machines: a Roland TR-606 and TB-303. Musically, Risveglio inhabits a similar space to its predecessor, with Cortini creating blurry, fluid dreamscapes built around semi-rhythmic loops, distorted chords and fuzzy ambient textures. Listeners may struggle to spot the TB-303 - most often used to create ragged waves of intense electronics - such is the unique way in which Cortini manipulates it. Regardless, the Italian's post-industrial, half-awake soundscapes are thoroughly mesmerizing.

Review: During the early 1980s, Kenneth 'Sumy' Sumter attempted to become Surinam's answer to Prince. While not wholly successful, he did record one killer album, 1983's Tryin To Survive. The original Galaxy Inc release of that album became something of a must-have for electrofunk and P-funk collectors, leading to a vinyl reissue on Rush Hour last year. That, too, flew off record shop shelves, so now the Dutch label has made it available on CD for the first time. Deliciously cheap sounding - it was made on a shoestring budget, after all - but brilliantly funky and soulful, Tryin To Survive remains a triumph of eccentric P-funk - all Roger Troutman posturing, slick Prince vocals, starry electronics and thickset synth basslines.

Review: Traditionally, Hospital's Med School offshoot has been used as a breeding ground for future D&B stars, often with a more experimental outlook. Anile, though, is no newcomer, having previously proved his production nous via 12" singles on DSM, Inneractive and Commercial Suicide. Perspective, though, is his debut album, and offers an ear-pleasing mix of woozy workouts, liquid-tinged rollers, cinematic fare (see the brilliantly evocative "Stay With Me") and classically-minded vocal numbers (see the S.P.Y style goodness of "Not The Way (To Run)". Keen to showcase the full breadth of his skills, Anile also serves up a couple of more experimental cuts, with the daring broken beat-meets-jungle flex of "Exchange" standing out.

Review: The eponymous debut album from London-based Welsh/Canadian duo Moon Ate The Dark was one of the most underrated downtempo sets of 2012; a thrillingly evocative set of piano compositions laden in reverb and subtle production trickery. While this year's follow-up, Moon Ate The Dark II, altered the formula a little - specifically by including a whisper of drone-inspired electronics and more imaginative production treatments - the mesmerising, eyes-wide-shut effect was the same. Here, the two albums are paired together for the first time on a two-disc set housed in a lovely, hand-printed sleeve. If you've not heard either album, it should be an essential purchase.

Review: Will "Quantic" Holland is a seriously talented guy. The veteran producer seems to be able to turn his hand to almost any genre, often assembling an all-new band to fit the brief. That's what he's done here, gathering together a sextet of Los Angeles-based jazz musicians under the Western Transient guise. A New Constellation, then, indulges his love of jazz, and specifically the classic material that emerged from L.A throughout the '50s, '60s and '70s. As you might expect, the playing is impeccable, with the emphasis on warm, rich sounds - think lilting horns, yearning guitar solos, rich Rhodes chords and gentle rhythms framed by his now familiar influences (bossa-nova, samba, soul, and so on).

Review: Victoria Hesketh has been something of a runaway success since first donning the Little Boots alias back in 2008. Over two sparkling albums, she successfully defined a colourful sound that joined the dots between vintage '80s synth-pop and contemporary dance styles. Working Girl, her third album, has no grandiose ambitions, and largely contents itself with providing a string of strong, radio-friendly pop moments. Of course, there are nods to all manner of past and present dance styles - see the Tom-Tom Club-aping eccentric disco-funk of "Better In The Morning", the Ibiza-friendly piano house of "Paradise", and the smooth US house flex of "Heroine" - plus a smattering of heart-aching slow numbers for more intimate moments.

Review: Bosh! Matrixxman, who has appeared on labels such as Dekmantel and Unknown To The Unknown, comes through utterly correct and most vertical with his debut album for Sam Valenti's Ghostly International stable - by now an institution of electronic dance music worldwide. Rather than being a concept album, Matrixxman simply drops some of his usual house debauchery on us across twelve moody yet bubbly dancefloor nuggets. There are spaces where the abstract governs, such as the opener "Necronomicron" or the excellent "Packard Plant" and "Dejected", but the majority of this LP is made up of raw drum machines jams and killer sci-fi electronics. Recommended!