Gypsophila

構成数 : 3枚
合計収録時間 : 00:00:00
Parisian producer Romain Reynaud is a multifaceted talent, producing various shades of house under multiple aliases and now, thick, densely textured techno under the Roman Poncet moniker. This album comes on Berlin techno don Len Faki's Figure label and is only its second full-length release in nearly a decade of activity, the first being Markus Suckut's debut DNA back in 2013. This is very European techno, with a big enough dose of that murky Berlin sound to justify its place on the Figure roster; but there's also a distinct dark ambient influence, as well as the obvious touches of house which Reynaud brings from his other work as Traumer, Adventice, and Sergie Rezza. There's a lot going on here; everything is beautifully produced, super-crisp and clear, and has a warm fusion of the organic and the artificial that really makes the album something special. "Do Not" starts things off with foghorns and static crackle before a vast supertanker looms out of the mist. "Hello You" begins with steadily building, overlapping tribal percussion and what sounds like ethnic instrumentation before loud synthetic stabs burst through, then fade out to an eerie vocal sample. The kicks finally start on "For Once We Saw the Light," which has a minimal, industrial house feel reminiscent of Mark E's Product of Industry album for Ghostly. "Thick Vegetation," the first single, is the album's first standout. "Thick" is exactly the right word; this has a bass sound you could cut with a knife and spread on your toast. Slow, subtle wood and metal percussion come in, then a haunting choral vocal sample. The whole thing masterfully evokes the mystery and danger of the primordial forest. "Piege" has a housey swing, a huge, absolutely filthy two-note bass riff, and percussion that sounds like clanking pipes -- 100-percent made for the basement. From there on in, the density just never lets up, and it's one banger after another, as "Epreuve," "In Aeternam," and "Never Ready" bludgeon the listener; only the languid, aquatic swing of the title track (named for the species of flowering plant commonly known as "Baby's Breath") brings things down a notch. Closer "Gentle Nightmare" has a dystopian feel, with a muted buzzsaw synth riff over long, spacy ambient tones. This album is genuinely, properly brilliant, and what makes it great is its variety. While many producers seem content to recycle the same track 12 times, Reynaud plays with a refreshingly diverse selection of elements and influences. For those into this kind of techno, it should be one of the highlights of the year. ~ John D. Buchanan