Artist: Rustie
Album: Essential Mix
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Releasing material on the UK’s highly acclaimed Warp imprint, Rustie’s style is largely a response to the minimalism of contemporary dance music. Consisting of hyper-driven synths, reverberating bass and cataclysmic rhythms, this is eye-popping music that is engaging and unrelenting. Rustie’s Essential Mix delivers the maximalist sound that one would expect and hope for, but there is plenty of diversity and a two hour mix time provides adequate space to allow the DJ to infuse personal hip hop, R&B and old-school rave favourites from the loft. It all comes together in a spectacular and vibrant soundscape.
Artist: Jack White
Album: Blunderbuss
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Profligate song smith Jack White has mastered some of music’s most ingrained genres and spat out albums in solo form and with his springboard band the White Stripes. Blunderbuss offers up no surprises content-wise, but it exudes all the hallmarks of thoughtful and accomplished production. There is a distinctly Bluesy feeling to the tracks, tempered by sincere rock n’ roll which is often catchy, always sublime and tied together with fantastic songwriting. This is an album that robustly injects its sound into the listener and the effects certainly take a while to shake off.
Artist: Chromatics
Album: Kill for Love
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Comfortably retro Portland-based electro-outfit Chromatics, appear to have ditched the gritty lo-fi and retrograde templates of their earlier sound and begun to wallow in the neon-bedazzled underworld of good ‘ol fashioned 80s electro pop. Their decision to opt for this vibe is abundantly apparent on this sultry and sophisticated album. The title track, Kill for Love is scintillatingly seedy, draped in exuberance, whilst These Streets Will Never Look the Same is a cool, calm and collected ode to a blessed-out nocturnal adventure. Alright, so the vocals occasionally verge on the irritating, but overall this is a bold release with lots of flashing pink-lights.