★★★★★
Released on Ripperton’s Tamed Musiq imprint, this EP is worth the price for the title track alone and should receive some pretty strong airtime when it drops in January. All steely high-hats and wraithlike vocals, the techy opener starts off in the vein of one of those chin-stroking deep house tracks that just sort of floats and basks in an ethereal glow – without ever going anywhere. But from out of nowhere, a nagging, bleeping synth hook enters, injecting some welcome dancefloor weight to its feather-light sullenness.
Crowdpleaser’s other offering on the release is ‘After Rhône’, a bulkier mechanical beast wielding coarse techno percussion fixed to an abundance of low-end. Not as immediately winsome as the opener, but a nicely organic piece of minimalist house-come-techno.
Oktay Uzcan’s ‘Haunted’ is less impressive, slender snares snap at the heel of an icy synth blast, well produced but a little too familiar. Lo Shea, however, turns in a better version, a more hard-hitting groove – the whooshes between each metallic hit giving the momentum of a giant, swinging pendulum.
Ripperton even makes an appearance for a bonus remix of ‘After Rhône’ under his Headless Ghost guise; erring on the experimental side, he lays down mangled, clanging percussion and bellowing horn-like synths. Marvelous.
Tamed Musiq | January | vinyl