Sunday 22 March 2009

PRE-ORDER: Joe – Grimelight/Rut [Hessle Audio]



The Leeds conglomerate, Hessle Audio, is back with its first wax platter of the year and after making all the steppas cry with the success of the truly sublime Pangaea tracks on HES006, ‘You & I’ and ‘Router’, the debut 12” from the unassumingly monikered Joe is anything but a disappointment.

‘Grimelight’ with its clicky, clipped wood block drums, claves and bells sends feet moving on the floor as Arabian flute melodies, sublime chords and his waves of warm, deep bass really hypnotise. Resting on the percussion is the key for this track and seemingly for Joe’s production in general as he works his sparse melody around the minimal patter of his congas.

The flipside ‘Rut’ is the killer here with yet more skipping drums, soulful piano stabs and organic building chords that work around a note or two, rolling out the enlightening effect of the synthesizer tones. There are hints of the Antisocial Entertainment sound of Silkie in this one with the free flowing funk coursing throughout the production, but Joe definitely has his own style and gives it all a super minimal, swung techno/future garage vibe.

To be fair it was always going to be a tough ask to follow Pangaea’s ‘Router’ but the Hessle camp have taken the challenge, picking up the gauntlet and running headlong into the fray with it. Joe’s first release is an expertly executed, skeletal slice of minimal programming that manages to retain that heavyweight skip that Hessle are so quickly becoming renowned for.

Links:
www.myspace.com/joemakemusic
http://www.myspace.com/hessleaudio

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