SECURE SHOPPING
Innervisions boss Dixon will helm the eighth and final mix in the esteemed Live At Robert Johnson series.
Âme’s Kristian Beyer has curated a compilation that delves into the obscure corners of experimental electronic music.
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According to online chatter in Innervision’s official forum, the label’s latest offering is a collaboration between Ame and I:Cube. Irrespective of whether this is true or not, one thing can be said with certainty about “Rotor” - it reaches the same high standards as the rest of Innervision’s back catalogue. The title track is influenced by micro house rather than minimal techno, as tiny, deconstructed beats underpin icy, crystalline melodies. There comes a point, midway through, where the track breaks down and the trancey riffs build back up to the kind of sublime climax last heard on Chadronnet’s “Eve By Day”.
Despite its undoubted ability to cause dancefloor hysteria, “Rotor” plays second fiddle to “Zuckerzeit”. It sounds like the authors have been listening to a lot of classic Efdemin and Pantha Du Prince, but also the raw house of labels like Workshop. No matter what the influences are, the end result is beguiling: evocative, chiming bells are layered over loose, lurching rhythms and glitchy artifacts. The end result is a complex but captivating arrangement that winds and flows its way towards an inevitable but nonetheless irresistible climax. Let’s hope that there are many more collaborations in the offing from Tete.
Richard Brophy
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After a brief hiatus on Japan’s Mule Musiq, South African Culoe De Song returns to Dixon’s Innervisions imprint with arguably his strongest work to date. Like his previous outings, this two-tracker offers an atmospheric, soft-focus take on deep house that’s in turns chilling and quietly uplifting.
Lead cut “Webaba” is a perfect example of De Song’s melancholic vision, building slowly and surely around a claustrophobic mix of mournful strings, Horror organs, intricate African percussion and looped Zulu chants. It’s strangely uplifting, despite the slight tearful air, and subtly builds in intensity over its near 10-minute duration. Describing it as cinematic or filmic doesn’t really do justice to its scope and scale; it’s certainly atmospheric, though.
Flipside “Far Away” is, if anything, more intense. Going for the jugular from the off with hurried kicks, snatched hi-hats and rolling organ licks, it quickly whips itself into a hypnotic brew of delay-laden handclaps, other-worldly string loops and apocalyptic chords. It’s not particularly dark – if anything, it’s rather positive in its outlook – but it does utilise the sound of constant rain and distant thunderclaps. Like “Webaba”, though, it’s a delight – even if it does have a slightly chilling air.
Innervisions have been a touch hit-and-miss of late, but this is one of their best – deep house for grown ups that should enthral those who like their house music smothered in smoky atmosphere.
Matt Anniss
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Innervisions team up with German organization Media in Cooperation and Transition on this 12 inch offering two remixes of award winning Sudanese musician Emmanuel Jal by Henrik Schwarz and The Knife’s Olof Dreijer. Borne out of the MICT curated Sudan Votes Music Hopes album which featured Jal along with other notable Sudanese musicians, it’s a further attempt to promote international awareness of the upcoming referendum in January 2011 in which South Sudan residents will vote on whether to become an independent state or remain under the tutelage of a united Sudan. Innervisions stalwart Schwarz is on fine form, basing a typically hypnotic groove around a nagging bassline and singular key throb. An oscillating synth melody and rushes of strings add momentum and there’s a brilliant breakdown into the harmonious vocal refrain for good measure. Dreijer’s remix utilises the vocals brilliantly, crafting a deep bouncing melody that works so well with the off kilter syncopation and brushing drums. The usual golf claps to Innervisions also for the really well thought out sleeve design.
Tony Poland
Interview: Dixon
Dixon, aka Steffen Berkhahn, likes to try new things. In the past 12 months there has been an adventurous live show, two (very different) mix compilations, and, most recently, a film score – much of which has been accomplished in partnership with long time friends Henrik Schwarz and Âme. Of all these projects, the Temporary Secretary mix, released last October, managed to stand above the rest. It was a mix in which he lovingly rejigged, reimagined and reinvented almost every track that featured, taking the parts and editing them to suit his chosen direction. It also injected some much needed life into a dying medium: the commercial mix CD. Dixon spoke to Juno Plus about his latest projects, a newfound passion for chess and why he is sick of the deep house resurgence.
Artist: Dixon/Ben Klock/Junior Boys/Precious System/Code 718
Title: Temporary Secretary (Dixon edits)
Label: Innervisions
Genre: Deep House
Format: 12″, Digital
Title: Temporary Secretary (Dixon edits)
Label: Innervisions
Genre: Deep House
Format: 12″, Digital
Buy From: Juno Records, Juno Download
Deep house type Dixon from Berlin’s Innervision’s crew has been dominating musical proceedings of late. Temporary Secretary, his first foray into mixes since the 2007 contribution to the Body Language series, has rightfully been critically lauded across the board (including on these here pages) for its take apart and put back together approach and stands apart from a sea of somewhat one dimensional mixes released this year.
Additionally, Dixon’s sublime reimagination of Lykke Li’s Dance Dance Dance which has set closer writen all over it, finally got released on all too limited vinyl and is likely to secure him space on the end of year lists that everyone likes to make.
A musical cherry on the Dixon pie is offered up by Innervison in the shape of three edits from the Temporary Secretary mix. Those familiar with the mix will need no further incentive to add these edits to their collection but the unfamiliar should read on.
It’s a exercise in futility to narrow down the release to one definitive highlight as all three edits are of the highest quality. Henrik Schwarz’s Equinox remix is given a hypnotic makeover that builds from a bouncing bassline into a pitter patter of pads and epic synths until the piano is dropped in. The clattering drum workout on Ben Klock’s mashup with Precious System demonstrates that deep house can contain funk whilst Dixons take on Ewan Pearson’s rerub of Junior Boys contains enough starry eyed melodies to drown in.
Review: Tony Poland
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