Article
Spotlight 6

Albums
17 Pygmies
Ælab
Aeroc
Adrian Aniol
Aleph
Artificial Memory Trace
B. Schizophonic / Onodera
Blue Fields
The Boats
Canyons of Static
Celer
drog_A_tek
Fennesz + Sakamoto
Marcus Fischer
Les Fragments de la Nuit
Daniel Thomas Freeman
From the Mouth of the Sun
Goth-Trad
Karol Gwózdz
Mark Harris
Inverz
Kingbastard
Tatsuro Kojima
Robert Lippok
Maps and Diagrams
Merzouga
Message To Bears
mpld
The New Law
Nuojuva
Octave One
Petrels
Puresque
Refractor
Lasse-Marc Riek
Jim Rivers
Dennis Rollins
Scuba
Shigeto
Susurrus
Jason Urick
VVV
Williamette
Windy & Carl
Zomes

Compilations / Mixes
DJ-Kicks: The Exclusives
Future Disco Volume 5
King Deluxe Year One
Phonography Meeting
Pop Ambient 2012

EPs
Blixaboy
Matthew Dear
Fovea Hex
Jacksonville
Kurzwellen 0
Phasen
Pascal Savy

Refractor: Locus Suspectus
Under The Spire

We're currently witnessing a synthesizer music resurgence thanks to people like Emeralds' Steve Hauschildt, the recipient of deserved attention for his 2011 Tragedy & Geometry release on kranky, and Daniel Lopatin, whose Oneohtrix Point Never outing Replica was generally regarded as one of last year's major releases. It would appear that San Francisco-based Jospeh Martinez's name should be added to the list on account of his Refractor opus Locus Suspectus, a twelve-inch vinyl collection (in an edition of 200) featuring eleven short improvisations produced using a single synthesizer. Martinez himself clarifies that “all mixing, panning, decay, and reverb [was] manipulated within the instrument [so as to] to embrace the limitations of one-take recordings with no additional editing.” All such details aside, what's refreshing about the tracks are their concision—no long-form ambient-dronescaping here!—with Martinez moving from one knob-twisted setting to the next in rapid succession. He also manages to squeeze a rich range of warble and rumble out of that lone synthesizer, plus parks any po-faced, end-of-the-world tendencies at the door to enliven the proceedings with a spirit of explorative curiosity. In short order, we hear the chime of bright, accordion-like tones (“Virtual Distractions”), low-end pulsations and flickerings (“Digital Crutches”), and even a few moments of serenading radiance (“Presence”). And when some hint of darkness does appear on the horizon, it does so for a blink-and-you'll-miss-it three minutes (“Undulating”). Martinez characterizes the work as “(s)awtooth waves of synthesized ramblings with Marshall McLuhan and Aldous Huxley in mind,” an apt and appropriately succinct description for his inviting set.

February 2012