I'm on an Easter break from work, so might get a few more of these things done... Speaking of Easter, has anybody else noticed something sly going on with chocolate eggs? They weigh less, and often come with one rather than two pieces of confectionery. Of course, there isn't the tiniest clue on the packaging that this is going on. It strikes me as an extension of the stealthy changes the chocolate companies brought about in their Christmas tins over the past couple of years (reducing weight, altering the individual sweets etc). It also reminds me of when the milk companies changed the amount of milk to half a litre instead of a pint, thereby increasing the price without obviously appearing to do this.
If it was the other way around, and Easter eggs got bigger, there'd be huge yellow stripes on their boxes screaming X% extra free. Amirite? Be egg-aware this Easter kids. Shop around.
#16 Sandwell District - Feed Forward
Feed Forward is an album of very high-minded techno in the honourable tradition that values anonymity and a 'machine-music' ethos over name recognition and any sort of crossover appeal (I've seen this album described time and time again as 'purist'). Sandwell District is not one producer, but rather a collective that has released a bunch of highly prized singles over the past decade or so. These singles were white-label jobs with no press or artwork, just catalogue numbers and the music itself, tunneling cosmic techno that subjugates the producer's human touch to the extent that you might wonder whether the continually unfurling sound is generated instead by a complex system of logarithms.
Over its nine tracks,
Feed Forward operates at two speeds. It switches gears more than once between sections of ambient drift and powerful propulsion, lending a dichotomous harmony to the listening experience. The inexorable forward trajectories of so many of these tracks end in places of nebulous calm, where synths as beautiful as any I've heard on a techno album ripple outwards towards the dark rim of space.
Feed Forward (also, was an album ever more appropriately named than this?)
is not the sort of album that will ever appeal broadly. The high and uncompromising style that I've already mentioned is not going to endear itself to a wide audience. It is machine-music, an end point of the future-utopia mindset associated with Detroit techno and, latterly, the Berghain nightclub in Berlin. However, if you step up to it with an understanding and acceptance of what it is (an exhilarating functional conduit to sensory places where the ego means little), you might well be astonished by the depth it contains.
MP3: Sandwell District-
Speed + Sound (Endless)
15 comments:
Very nice indeed. Regis in particular has talked about the label's desire to escape the perceived disposability of techno by packaging a project's complete and unrestrained vision, and in both sight and sound Feed-Forward is a total immersion in the Sandwell District deep. From a broader perspective you could argue that in this regard the collective are simply aping their DIY post-punk era influences. But in a modern day when most things are easy, free and instant, looking to the past is probably the best way of eliciting an imagined future. Good One!!
You’re fully five songs into this album before the expected thump finally takes hold, but by the time “Speed + Sound (Endless)” wraps things up half an hour later, the reason this album is so cherished among techno heads becomes clear: It is for them. As opposed to recent club crossovers like, say, Ellen Allien or Pantha du Prince, Sandwell District cares nothing for mind-blowing theatrics or daredevil drama. Even Regis, Sandwell’s de facto jefe, has admitted his own shortcomings. In some ways, it shows: There are no vocals, there are no bells (or whistles), and there are no obviously superior tracks — Feed-Forward plays unapologetically close to its creators’ restrained strengths and only takes chances within the well-trod confines of techno’s early millennial excursions.
are these original comments or cut and pastes from reviews or something? I don't understand.
I've never been so insulted, please!!!
About the Easter egg fiasco, man it's happening with everything these days take a closer look.
I really liked your music choice this time.
everything's shrinking!
These comments are no place for discussion it seems! Give Gardenhead some praise and share your own excellent thoughts on the album and he'll accuse you of 'cutting and pasting'. Feel for you anonymous bro
Oh please forgive me my lord of the Compost Heap and lord STORKBOY, I do not knowest what has cometh over me, Apologies,
Anonymous Cut & Paste.
Like no one else has a brain, and can write about something they actually know about. Anonymous cut and paste. Get your head out the compost heap!!!
:-)
errm http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/6182
I was wondering how long it would take for you to find the article. There were lots of articles to choose from basically saying the same thing as you wrote in the blog. Apparently no one person seems to be honest here. You can research all you want but in the end all you’re doing is rewriting in your own words and also using some from your research. For all of your hard work in finding the correct article you have won a Colonoscopy Mr. Anal Retentive. Enjoy!!!
Anonymous, I'm genuinely offended at what you are trying to insinuate. Neither of your original two weird comments bear much relation to what I wrote.
And yah, I read plenty of press around this album, of course: sure I say at the top of the piece that I heard it time and time again described as "purist", but as for rewording other pieces? Jog on. I wondered if the two comments were cut and paste because they appeared a few moments after I posted and appeared to be weirdly complete and well written.
To be honest I'm more than a little weirded out that someone is getting hung up on my writing like this. Like why bother?
Do I know you in real life?
Hey, what happened 2 that post I thot you did on weird public-art sculptures? (Was it squashed by your Chamber of Commerce?)
I'm not complaining -- since you seem 2 B having enuf fun already -- but I was gonna say I kinda liked The Book, & could even see where sitting on it might B kind of fun ... as long as you don't slip in2 that slimy mid-fold. ...
Am I at the right blog? Was that some sorta April Fool's Day post? Things R getting a little strange around here, Rn't they? Keep laughing....
hi ta, i took it down myself after feeling guilty. you are on the right blog. Stick around.
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