VA: Collection 100
Kombination Research

For anyone devotedly following The Advent's Kombination Research label, its 100th release will be indispensable: the 110-minute compilation boasts twenty-two raw techno tracks, nineteen by The Advent (sixteen from his back catalog and three previously unreleased) and three by Murat, Joey Beltram, and Davide Squillace that initially surfaced on split EPs with The Advent. All such material originally appeared on vinyl and CD, but Collection 100 marks the first time it's been made available digitally (the CD set is a double-disc affair). For the record, The Advent began two decades ago as a collaboration between Portuguese producer Cisco Ferreira and Colin McBean (aka Mr. G), though Ferreira been the project's solo pilot for years now.

Even if the title of the opening cut, “P.Tek,” isn't an abbreviated form of “Pure Techno,” it certainly could be: with its furious 4/4 pulse, ringing cymbals, and wiry melodic figure, The Advent track comes as close to being the fundamental template for the form as could possibly be imagined. It's hardly the only one of its kind included: punishing crushers such as “Inn Search,” “Mononix,” “Backlash,” and “Monatomic” bring an equal if not even greater degree of muscle to the proceedings. Kombination Research has issued other material besides techno, too, as illustrated by Ferreira's electro-fied burners “Elektra Fix,” “Visualize,” and “Bass High,” and The Advent's “Two Rock” also shows the label's willingness to explore slightly left-field territory.

A couple of tracks are live takes from Detroit (“Mind, Body & Soul,” “Live Segment”), and on the guests tip, Murat stokes frenzy via the mad rush of “Missing” whilst also working in some unexpectedly carnivalesque flavour in the process, Squillace's “Bike on the Rocks” broils at a relentless, raw pitch, and Beltram's frenetic “Fractals,” one of the collection's more decimating cuts, plunges deep into a techno inferno. That pounding throb you hear shaking the foundations of the dance club down the block at three in the morning? It could well be one of these thunderous productions by The Advent.

January 2016