Also people where we live are very focused and Queens Of The Stone Age-style guitar rides, while Blade people are getting into,” extends Florian. “With all the
industrious — we’re perfectionists and that’s the way we Runner cinematics are swept across the album. tracks on this album, we’re trying to take the scene away
approach our music. That’s why my own output isn’t that For those that can brave the brutality, it’s an album to from the noisy cluttered mixdowns and bring back the
prolifi c, I have four or fi ve tunes a year, rather than 20. I lose yourself in rather than generic rave fodder — cans music. Personally, I’ve lost a bit of the aggression since I
focus on the perfection of the sound. There’s a clear on, eyes-closed and out into the galaxy. released ‘Psycho’ [Phace’s debut LP on Subtitles in 2007]
vision in my head and I work hard on my tracks to get “I like my music to have soul — that’s really important to — I’m not that young rebel anymore.”
that across.” me,” explains Florian. “There’s so many techstep tunes “I always remember what Dan from Vicious Circle told us
“It’s German engineering man, we’re just not happy ‘till out there and I don’t want to disrespect anyone, but when we [Phace] released the ‘Pyscho’ LP, he said ‘your
it’s exactly how we want it,” adds Florian. “Sometimes some of them just sound very noisy for the sake of it. tracks are so dirty, I feel like I need to wash my hands
we are too much into detail, sometimes it can be a hurdle They’re not catchy, they don’t have any soul and they after hearing them’ [laughs] and that’s what we’re still
— you get lost in the precision — but with this album don’t do anything new.” aiming for,” he adds. “But we want that anger to be
we’re trying to balance a precise, structured hard tech controlled from a production point of view. We don’t
vibe and dynamic sound structure with a more melodic, Wider Territories want it sounding too messy or noisy.”
harmonic feel. We want our music to move people on a But while ‘From Deep Space’ is essentially a galvanising
musical level as well as on a technical level.” rebirth for futuristic techstep, its journey also sets the Elsewhere, Phace’s solo offerings see the German
radar towards wider sonic territories — in keeping with producer slam the breaks right on for opener ‘Channel
And that’s the crux of Phace & Misanthrop’s impact on the current spirit of sonic adventurism within the drum & Feel’, a digitally twisted downtempo grinder loaded with
this album. The digitally twisted visions of ‘From Deep bass scene at large. machine mutilated funk and ’70s guitar licks, while
Space’ might be constructed with sci-fi imagery and Inspired by a documentary the guys watched on the ‘Generation For Sale’ is a distorted disco crunch-up that
rampaging machines in mind, but there’s an innate, distant star of Arae, Phace & Misanthrop’s collaborative references his love of French robot funk masters Daft
underlying funk beneath their machine growl groove — effort ‘My Arae’ feels like their contribution to the Punk and their direct descendants Justice.
as well as a musicality missing from some of their earlier current school of stripped-back, slowed-down d&b Misanthrop, meanwhile, locks his sub missiles towards
excursions. minimalism — think Instra:mental, dBridge and ASC — the experimental ends of the dubstep sound through his
On Phace’s ‘Regenerate The Blues’ the sort of clipped jazz but loses none of their trademark brutality for it; sheets heavyweight breakstep monster ‘Shadow’ — a track
motifs that were once the staple of the V Records/Full of seething cinematic synth darkness rising up over a sea caught somewhere between the spacious dub dread of
Cycle crew are worked against a wriggling, demonic bass of edgy, twitched out click beats and sucker punch amen Mala and the more uncompromising, hyperactive
snake, ‘Interplay’ hijacks desert rock vibes thanks to its tear-outs. industrialism of Planet Mu’s Vex’d.
“It’s our take on this minimal approach that a lot of “When I was in the US a couple of years ago, I stayed
with Mayhem from Shadow Law and he played me a load
of dubstep that just blew my head off,” he tells us. “I
realised that everyone in the US was playing dubstep
before the drum & bass sets, and it showed me how the
two sounds can sit alongside each other. The speed
change might be extreme, but it just added to the
impact.”
And it’s this more expansive approach that will direct the
trajectory of their Neosignal label. As well as Phace
collaborations with kindred d&b spirits Spor and Noisia,
the label’s future output promises to showcase both
Phace and Misanthrops’s alternative experiments — be
they with dubstep, techno or digital electronica.
“I love drum & bass, I live drum & bass still, but it’s really
essential to reach other people and make them
interested in what’s going on in this scene,” concludes
Florian. “And that’s starting to happen. New people are
getting interested in it again.”
WE HAVE THE
TECHNOLOGY
Five essential techstep albums
from across the ages
Various Artists
‘Tech Steppin’ (Emotif) 1996
Ed Rush & Optical
‘Wormhole’ (Virus) 1998
Grooverider
‘Mysteries Of Funk’ (Higher Ground) 1998
Teebee
‘Black Science Labs’ (Certifi cate 18) 2000
Noisia
‘fabriclive 40’ (fabric) 2008
www.djmag.com
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DJ482.phace_feature.indd 45 13/1/10 15:52:10
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