Available on: Planet Mu LP

An integral part of the early nucleus of producers and labels that helped spur dubstep’s rise to fame in the mid 00’s, Vex’d (aka Jamie and Roly) are finally following up their 2005 debut Degenerate with Cloud Seed, a lost second album that is seeing the light of day on Planet Mu this month.

Vex’d’s unique take on the emerging sound was what set them apart from their peers in the early days – their first singles and debut album brought a sonic palette to the still-being-defined genre that had more in common with industrial and heavy metal contrasting with the at times primarily dub-, jungle- or 2step-influenced productions that were emerging in ’04 and ’05. Degenerate has since then regularly been referenced as one of dubstep’s most classic albums, if you will, not least because the music had a quality to it that has been rarely matched both in terms of composition but also production – Vex’d tracks have always sounded big but they’ve also always had a depth to them if you cared to move past the obvious elements.

A few singles followed the debut in ’06 and ’07 and then nothing. The second album had been hinted at but was never delivered. The short of it is that geographical separation – Jamie moved to Berlin in ’07 while Roly moved to Brighton – and a drift into other musical interests (most notably Jamie’s foray into hip hop/dubstep hybrids under his own name and Kuedo) meant that a second Vex’d LP was unlikely to happen anytime soon, making the release of Cloud Seed all the more special.

Referred to as a lost album, Cloud Seed combines previously released singles and remixes from the last five years alongside new and previously unreleased/unfinished tracks. The split between old and new is roughly 50/50 with classics like ‘Killing Floor’ (here appearing in edited form), ‘Fallen remix’, ‘Take Time Out’ featuring Warrior Queen and Jamie’s criminally slept-on Plaid remix ‘Bar Kimura’ all appearing as well as their little-known ambient remixes for John Richards and Gabriel Prokofiev.  And despite being a mixed bag of old and new the most surprising thing about Cloud Seed is its coherence as an album. To do it any justice it needs to be heard from beginning to end as a whole rather than something you can dip in and out of.

The newer tracks are often in stark contrast to their previous output yet they all blend in together beautifully. ‘Shinju Bridge’ and ‘Slug Trawl Depths’ offer a much more paced, ambient vibe, ‘Out of the Hills’ is a perfect follow up to Degenerate’s ‘Crusher Dub’ while the last track ‘Nails’ shows that the pair still have a penchant for loud and claustrophobic sonic assaults that reference their heavy metal roots. Then there is ‘Heart Space’, featuring Anneka on vocals, a beautiful reimagining of some of their more classic riddims as well as ‘Disposition’ featuring New York MC Jest, who turns the track into the perfect descendant of El-P’s productions for people like Cannibal Ox.

In many ways Cloud Seed’s coherence is a testament to Jamie and Roly’s talents and the quality of their music. It shows that you can make electronic dance music that can stand the test of the time (even if it’s a short test) but also that they are still one of the few production outfits attached to the dubstep scene that can evade simple categorizations of what their music sounds like. Considering that in the five years it’s taken this album to come out the ‘scene’ has dramatically changed, and not necessarily for the better, Cloud Seed is a much needed breath of fresh air that reminds you of the potential of the music’s core fundamentals – its speed but also the long-forgotten (or so it seems at times) spirit of freedom that embodied dubstep’s early days, a time where experimentations with the sound were more easily accepted and embraced.

Fans will no doubt be pleased to finally have a second album to get stuck into but perhaps the best thing about Cloud Seed is that it’s also a perfect album for those who didn’t get into Degenerate and its follow-up singles so much. Where those tracks were in your face, Cloud Seed is much more laid-back and inviting, the perfect way to entice previous listeners to give them another chance and discover another side to their music, one that isn’t as obvious as the brutality that sometimes defined their earlier output. It’s good to have them back and let’s hope it isn’t five years until the next one.

Laurent Fintoni