The journey that has taken Coldcut’s Jonathan
More and Matt Black from the burgeoning rave scene of
the mid-eighties to setting up Ninja Tune to the release
of this latest album is that of a constant refocusing
and adaptation of the pair’s inquisitive minds
and visionary approach.
Formed after the pair met in a record shop, Coldcut
went on to become one of the most prominent acts of
the late eighties, with tracks such as Say Kids,
What Time Is It?, Doctorin’ The House
or People Hold On and countless remixes placing
them at the heart of the dance scene. While these dance
floor classics also propelled Coldcut to the top of
the charts, their consequent progressive vision of electronic
music saw them increasingly refining their original
sound to include more obvious elements of hip-hop, rock
and soul. Each one of the pair’s following releases
proved more genre-bending, showcasing Coldcut’s
thirst for experimentation.
In the early nineties, Black and More founded Ninja
Tune and began promoting a wide range of new artists,
from the likes of DJ Food, Amon Tobin, DJ Vadim or Mr
Scruff to Hexstatic, Kid Koala, The Cinematic Orchestra
or Skalpel. They later
on expended the label’s activities by setting
up N-Tone (now dormant) and Big Dada, a sub-label dedicated
primarily to hip-hop, with releases by cLOUDDEAD,
Busdriver, Infintie
Livez, Roots Manuva or Part
2 to name but a few.
The last known musical sign to have filtered out of
the Coldcut lab going back to the 2001 general election
single Re:evolution, Sound Mirrors is nothing
short of a major event, and the impressive list of collaborators,
including the likes of Jon Spencer, Roots Manuva, John
Matthias, Robert Owens, Saul Williams, Andrew ‘Fog’
Broder, Soweto Kinch and Mpho Skeef to name but a few,
is an indication for the sheer amplitude of the project.
Featuring twelve tracks, Sound Mirrors is by
far Coldcut’s most complex and varied release
to date. With elements of hip-hop, rock, soul, grime,
techno, blissful pop and more constantly colliding,
this album continues on the pair’s colourful blend
of dance music first properly developed on Let Us
Play, yet, nine years have passed since and things
have undoubtedly moved on. While the old Coldcut sound
carried its sample-based structures on its sleeve, these
days, More and Black offer slicker, smoother surfaces.
Yet, this is not to say that the sound is in any way
more polished. Tracks such as Everything Is Under
Control, True Skool or Boogieman
aren’t scared to roughen things up. Elsewhere,
the quieter, more subtle side of Coldcut graces the
wonderful Walk A Mile, Sound Mirrors
and Colours The Soul, providing welcome breaks
throughout.
If the bluesey Man In A Garage, with John Matthias
on vocal duties, the soulful Whistle And A Prayer
or the haunting Mr Nichols all prove at once
classic and totally modern and fresh, Coldcut also let
in the rather dated Just For The Kick and Everything
Is Under Control, which seem to have very little
to do with the rest of the album, or with anything Coldcut
have ever been about.
Sound Mirrors is far more complex and demanding
than it first lets think. Pushing their sound into the
most remote corners of their imagination, Coldcut continue
to develop and open up new grounds for others to explore.
Nine years have passed since their last album was released,
yet, through their work with Ninja Tune and various
art projects, Matt Black and Jonathan More have kept
their finger on the electronic pulse. Sound Mirrors
is very much the proof.
4.2/5 |
