I Lost Myself In the Ether...

Let's kick things back into rhythmic overdrive with Reboot's new "Rambon EP" on Cadenza.

The A-side, "Rambon", features a slick, churning kick with a perfectly flittering synth line that has been hung out to dry amongst the clinking of glasses and plates and light orchestral music, as if this cut was recorded in the kitchen of the Bellagio. Reboot has a penchant for marrying the robotic with the organic, and this track is definite credence to that fact. The rhythm feels natural and lucid, nothing is forced upon the listener in any way. Add in watered-down hi-hats and the tried-and-true 'gravel clap' and you have yourself another tech house gem from Reboot. But the magic does not end here. About halfway in, Reboot, a.k.a. Frank Heinrich, unleashes a snaking steel drum line that drunkenly staggers through the track, fading and rising at the drop of a hat. It's an odd tactic, but the ethereal quality it brings with it counterpoises the dense drum production beautifully, the end result turning out to be a glossy, rhythmic tech house cut that strays from the minimalistic to the ambient, organic techno that Cadenza is known for. Beautiful background music or dance music, either way you spin it.



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On the flip, Cadenza head-honcho Luciano turns up to remix Reboot's "Uruana". Having not heard the original, I cannot speak to what Luciano alters here, so I will simply describe what the track sounds like under Luciano's guidance. If you have ever heard any of Luciano's top-quality productions (Orange Mistake, Arcenciel, Father, etc.) this track will be nothing new: a dense, minimal soundscape with lush, fragile ambience, woven into the the sparse drum production and water-droplet synths Luciano so loves to use. The melody is fractured, having no real beginning or end, simply ebbing and flowing with the other elements of the track. In any other instance this is a big mistake, but as we are talking about Luciano and Cadenza here, it is quite acceptable. This is minimal, organic techno at it's ambient best: the sound has no real start or end, and when new elements swirl into the mix, you hardly notice them. The sound grows and changes as a whole, as a single element, not as separate sounds. Wonderful mood music, head music, background music. An early morning lounge cut if ever there was one.



-NL