Available on: Hyperdub 12″
Original
John Roberts remix
Economic collapse has a soundtrack, and it’s nostalgia mixed with blues set to a detached dance beat. A clutch of UK and American synth-pop artists captured the 1980s recession zeitgeist with songs that spoke of mysterious metro rides, European females, walking in Los Angeles and collapsing new people. Fad Gadget, Yaz and Depeche Mode’s dystopic dance music along with emerging Detroit techno releases suited the anxious shift from industrial to information society with equally haunted sounds. Now a new crop of artists is abandoning minimal techno’s sophisticated thump and dubstep’s powerful bass bombast for music that reflects our current jobless and skint times.
A retro-‘80s synth music trend has been building in various music quarters for some time and now electronic acts like Hyperdub’s Darkstar, who originally made their name on 8-bit leaning garage, are looking back at ideas from previous decades, albeit without totally sacrificing their progressive sounds. This shift has allowed Darkstar to expand to a trio, explore vocal songwriting and the freedom to add analog dust to the mix and melancholy to the melody to better suit this generation’s artistic perspective.
Darkstar’s James Young, Aiden Whalley and vocalist James Buttery channel a new century’s angst into compelling sounds that flirt with ‘80s techno-pop without succumbing to its sonic clichés or outdated clothing. Taken from their Hyperdub album North, ‘Gold’ is a cover of a Human League B-side that gently updates the forgotten gem. Whalley and Young frame Buttery’s voice with drifting synth backdrops punctuated by proper lead piano signatures and a subtle, skittering backing rhythm, Buttery’s reserved delivery fitting the song’s poetic mood to a tee. ‘Gold’ is a supremely listenable song, wistful enough to accompany daydreams and morning tea on Sundays.
A remix by Berlin based American John Roberts draws on neo-classical techno textures from his recent Dial Records full-length Glass Eights and combines mechanical early techno grooves with cascading melodies. Roberts’ version loops Darkstar’s original piano riffs, adds mallet percussion and staccato Roland drum machine claps to an otherwise straightforward dance beat. The vocals only appear as samples toward the middle of the mix, which allows more attention to be paid to Roberts’ intricate layering techniques and chilled arrangements. Bundled together these two tracks have a timeless shine.
Tomas A. Palermo