Black Noise

Pantha du Prince aka Hendrik Weber is a red hot German producer who has specialized in ambient house music over a number of albums including his previous work 2007s "This Bliss" which accurately described itself. His moniker is drawn from a mix of Detroit techno and the black panthers and the music is crystalline electronic music for the new century full of shimmering, bell-like tones strung out and stretched against a backdrop of gentle micro-beats.

This is Weber's first release on Rough Trade and I first heard him on the extraordinary 12 inch single "Splendour". Think David Bowie's stunningly fragile "Moss Garden" off "Heroes" and set it in the Swiss Alps in Winter and that is the effect. It bubbles with chimes and beats and reminds you of falling snow. This album has you grasping for superlatives. The nearly seven minute long "Es schneit" is a particular highlight building on a slow wall of synths and a spare drum like motif it is an intensely powerful track and strangely beautiful. "Turn off you mind relax and float down stream" as someone once advised.

And yes of course you knew somewhere in this mix you would find the Animal Collective. "Stick by my Side" features a guest spot from Panda Bear (Noah Lennox) whose vocal accompanies a stunning song set to beats that have a Fever Ray style pulsing crispness in the instrumentation and clearly it is the most commercial song on the album. If this is the new direction for Animal Collective then its intriguing.

This is a very long album but all it requires is your rapt attention. The slow drift of those beautiful chimes in the opener "Lay in a shimmer" make you understand the powerful effect that Weber's relocation to the Swiss Alps to record this ambient monster must have had (he was taking "field recordings" - as you do!). It becomes such a dizzying but controlled noise (in the best sense) that at one point it is almost overwhelming. Alternatively in the "Nomads Retreat" we have a hard house number which will be mixed into oblivion on the web, it will soundtrack the sun going down in Ibiza this year and is another massive highlight. "Beneath the stars" with its dark vocal is even more trippy and at times sounds like Massive Attack. Finally "Satellite Snyper" is as funky and club bound as ambient music can get and is fully danceable.

Like Four Tet's excellent recent album "There is love in you" this album by Pantha du Prince proves that the simple power of sound is truly a force of nature. Black Noise could suggest something ugly and hard. In fact it is a recording of clarity and brightness. It is as beautiful and glacial as the lake on the album cover

This album caught my attention when it was reviewed on NPR. The intriguing gamelan-like sounds, the non-melodic melody, the whole minimalist glitch-techno was so totally different that I had to pull it up and listen to it in a better environment than the car on the freeway. I ended up purchasing it.

What a treat! The mark (for me, at least) of a fantastic album is its 'stickiness'- how long will I play it, how long will it loop in my mind. I have to say, that it didn't leave my main playlist for six weeks. It's in my 'desert island' file, too- which is not easy to get into.

How can I describe the music? It's icy. Complex. Brilliant. Layered. Tons of little things going on, that sometimes jump out on one play, or vanish the next. I found myself wondering what he was using as instruments- a Hang drum? Some bells from a pinball machine? Some Tibetian singing bowls? Rocks? Someone drawing on a chalkboard? All these neat little sounds were set to irresistable beats- with big sub-thumping bass that would alternately hum and thunder. "Stick To My Side" really stuck out, but so did "Nomad's Retreat", and "Bohemian Forest", which became my favorite. "Lay In A Shimmer" has the sparkling hum of electric water, with some lovely chimes and bells- almost a gamelan sound.

The long grooves are never tiring, and the album as a whole has a 'stickiness' that serves it well. If you want something refreshingly different, you cannot go wrong with this.

I happened upon this CD by chance, looking for something fresh to listen to. These works are really different, incorporating the ambients sounds woven into poetic harmonies and fast paced cadences. For all those who like this genre, a great find.

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