Relief blows in on a warm gulf breeze like
a balmy benediction. The laidback atmosphere is soon
ratcheted onto a tech-house beat, all copy and paste
cropping and insistent meter. Surprise guest is a similarly
hedged saxophone, matched and moulded to the décor.
That breeze breathes gently in and slowly out: if it
weren’t for the determined beat, it might serve
as welcome accompaniment to meditation. Lub
deletes the saxophone as surplus to requirement and
substitutes scratch for breeze. It sounds very much
like its predecessor, but given the contemplative nature
of the music, this is no bad thing. Fifteen minutes
in and it feels like one’s been here forever.
Omni sounds at the outset as if it might be
about to take a left turn, but soon returns to the one,
true path. The rhythm’s chug is a touch funkier,
its syncopated figures sound like they’re tripping
over one another in measured haste. Smoke looms a little
heavier on the horizon, Glow is an Escher-like
circular falling of scree that never hits virtual bottom.
It reminds this listener of something, but his memory
refuses to disclose its secret, perhaps it is Jan Jelinek,
but not quite, perhaps Higher Intelligence Agency around
the time of Freefloater, but no that’s
not it either.
Relief is a delicious dessert that betrays none
of its composer’s Mexican background. Rather,
it’s clearly a product of a global, digital culture:
sanitised but wary, painstakingly assembled, but rendered
apparently simply.
Colin Buttimer
3/5 |
