ALBUMSREVIEWS 8.0
Letherette Letherette Ninja Tune Little red Letherette!
Mount Kimbie
Cold Spring Fault Less Youth Warp Records
9.0 The not-so-difficult second
NONE of us need to be reminded of the success of ‘Crooks & Lovers’, Mount Kimbie’s nectar-like debut LP on Hotflush in 2009. After benchmarking a sound many loosely touted as “post-dubstep”, the Brighton-based duo have refused to sink with it, as the underground appeal of the liquid two-step garage formula has faded in conjunction with Radio One playlisting and consequential chart placement. The solution? For MK, it’s been to keep their head beneath the parapet, wait for the right time to pounce with a response that really blows people out the water. ‘Cold Spring Fault Less Youth’ is certainly that. Turning to values more closely connected with avant-garde pop acts — Teengirl Fantasy, Ghostpoet, wonk on Black Acre — they’ve kept the formula fresh, nudging it forward a few inches. Cunningly turning a jazz sample into a dusty pop track built around soft organ chords, echoed steel strings and reverberated vocals over a dampened 4/4 bass beat, opener ‘Home Recording’ is lo-fi emo, more
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shoegaze than the wobble-step of, say, ‘Blind Night Errand.’ ‘Adriatic’ on ‘C&L’ indicated the duo’s interest in organic instrumentation, but it’s infused here with the purple drank cloud rap of ‘You Took Your Time’, hung on the slurred (but poetic) mumblings of King Krule. ‘Blood And Form’ is a shredded, pitch- bent interpretation of a marching band led by Adam Ant, closer to These New Puritans than SBTRKT. ‘Made To Stray’ is majestic minimal with a rousing vocal overture, and ‘So Many Times, So Many Ways’ could be a dubbed-out Fugazi! Tinged with sepia tones throughout, ‘CSFLY’ evokes the audio equivalent of 8mm film — an “Instagrammed” sunset, even. Littered with leathery cracks and ivory keys, cavernous sub bass and off-kilter frequencies, the duo cut a more vivacious foil to James Blake; take more risks, reveal more personality — without confusing genuine innovation with obscurity. Mount Kimbie’s second album is a ruddy triumph, no two ways about it. Adam Saville
9.0
Two Armadillos Golden Age Thinking Two Armadillos Smooth on the inside
It will always be a matter of great sadness that one half of Two Armadillos — the late Martin Dawson — missed the release of their debut album. Much of this set was penned over several weeks Dawson and Secretsundaze co-founder Giles Smith spent in Berlin in 2011. A selection of ‘tracks to stand the test of time’ were made, with references to the house music greats (Larry Heard, Ron Trent) and other shared cultural touchstones (Woody Allen, from where the title is lifted). Happily, this is a most fitting tribute, the passion for the music Dawson loved foremost in its execution. From the burbling acid in ‘Roller Skate’ and ‘Black Dahlia’, to the subtly anthemic ‘Theme’ and the shimmering bliss of ‘Another One For Larry’, this is a joyous celebration of house music, of life lived and loved. Ben Arnold
Ekkohaus No School Moon Harbour Just house
Produced as a reaction to what he regards as a somewhat pointless debate between old school and new school values, ‘No School’ is Greek-born Kostas Tassopoulous’ everything-in-the-pot house manifesto. An album that effortlessly meanders from jazz (‘A Drive’) to disco (‘A Reparations’) to samba (‘Chasing Brown’) to tech (‘Rendezvous’) to broken beat (‘Keep Your Eyes On Me’), all within a rich deep house context, it pretty much all sounds lush — if at times a little safe. Stand-out moments come in the form of ‘Just Click’, a chunky number with a loopy hook and some sampled chat about things working, coming together (“everything was right”) — presumably on the dancefloor, and ‘Touch House’, a homage to Chicago with heavy metallic stabs. File under: timeless. Adam Saville
8.0
Making their mark on Gilles Peterson’s ‘Brownswood Electr*c’ compilation in 2010, Letherette set their stall out as one for funky Y3K soul. Subsequent releases for Ho_Tep saw them flogging cut-up samples like sticks of rock on the seafront of Margate. For some, however, the discordance that originally attracted them also put them off. For every sugary-sweet sample was a ruptured refrain, a jutting time-signature or jarring reversal of polarity. Angular, sure, but hardly breezy. However, on the debut LP, they’ve reined it in. ‘After Dawn’ isn’t far off Boys Noize when he reinvented Feist, ‘D&T’ is ‘Discovery’ put through a shredding device, while ‘Restless’ is what we can expect if (when) Jesse Ware collaborates with Velour. Overall, there’s all the trippy hip-hop, funk, soul, swing and chipmunk voices you’d expect, held together with enough restraint to keep ears engaged past the hour mark. Lisa Loveday
8.0
Jimpster Porchlight and Rocking Chairs Freerange Not house but home
Freerange has been the very definition of deep house for more than a decade, no matter the prevailing trend. Here label boss Jamie Odell steps up for his first album in six years — but his sixth in all — and reports it is inspired by time spent in limbo in airport waiting lounges early on weekend mornings. Happily, though, its no washed-out, half thought-up album of phoned-in house, but quite the opposite. ‘Porchlight and Rocking Chairs’ finds Odell at his most lush, his most layered and most accomplished for some while. Tracks are laden with swooping and swoonsome synths, golden strings, effervescing pianos and catchy percussive lines to the point that it’s impossible not to get lost in amongst them all. As the title suggests, it’s very much one for after the club rather than in it, but is all the more listenable as a result. Kristan J Caryl
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