Articles
2009 Artists' Picks
Lymbyc Systym

Albums
Cory Allen
aus
The Bird Ensemble
Canaille
Catlin & Machinefabriek
Greg Davis
Loren Dent
Dirac
Drafted By Minotaurs
Flica
Sarah Goldfarb & JHK
Gown
John Hollenbeck
Viviane Houle
I/DEX
Akira Kosemura
Andrew McKenna Lee
Le Lendemain
LRAD
Lymbyc Systym
Melorman
Muskox
The Mercury Program
Nikasaya
Northerner
nörz
Noveller / Aidan Baker
Redshape
Marina Rosenfeld
Stripmall Architecture
Sturqen
Wes Willenbring
The Tony Wilson Sextet
Julia Wolfe
Peter Wright
Zelienople

Compilations / Mixes
Blackoperator
Glimpse Four:Twenty 03
Kod.eX
Portland Stories

EPs
Molnbär Av John
Tommi Bass & B.B.S.C.
Julian Beau
Colours-Volume 5
Dalot
Echologist
Simon James French
Geiom & Shortstuff
General Elektriks
Geskia
Ernest Gonzales
Gradient
Jacksonville
Joker
Ann Laplantine
Loko
Machinefabriek
Stefano Pilia
Damian Valles

VA: Four:Twenty Music 03 (mixed by Glimpse)
Four:Twenty

What impression would listeners new to Four:Twenty form after hearing Glimpse's mix? Chances are words like funky, minimal, and soulful would appear most often. The Bristol label's Music:03 is ‘body music' for sure, and exudes a degree of sweat that too many other mixes lack. Glimpse (Christopher Spero) arranges twenty-seven tracks selected from the label's fifty-release catalogue into an hour-long house mix that's smoother, subtler, and more homogenous than most. Part of the reason why it sounds so cohesive is because particular names show up repeatedly in the mix, with James Mowbray, Leiam Sullivan, D.Ramirez, Solomun, Cherry, Jim Rivers, and Class 71 all making multiple appearances (also along for the ride are remixers Manuel Tur, Move D, Loco Dice, and Christian Prommer, among others).

“Free Harmonic Blues” by Mowbray and Sullivan gets the mix moving with a lithe snap and swing that Rivers et al. perpetuate in their own clubby cuts. The mix goes deep from start to finish, and funky and tribal too as it powers its way through Solomun's “Explicit” and “Deadman,” Two Armadillos' “Butterfly,” Loco Dice's “Phat Dope Shit,” Cherry's “Momo” and “Conona,” Martin Buttrich's “Medicine Man,” and more. An ululating sprinkle of Indian chanting here, a slice of throbbing tech-house and dubby house there, and a whole lot of bass-powered thrust pretty much everywhere else and you've got the idea. As it enters the final laps, the feverish pitch gradually eases up, until coming to rest with a wistful, piano-and-vocal-based coda of Sigur Rós-like character. Spero, whose Drifting EP appeared on Carl Craig's Planet E and whose debut studio album, Runner, will be issued on Cross Town Rebels in early 2010, brings a soulful and oft-jazzy vibe to this fabulous mix plus an improvised feel too (stemming to some degree from the fact that Spero uses only analogue equipment and, recording most of his tracks live, edits afterwards).

January 2010