April 1999

The Rob Lo fidelity experience...

Pablo Casals

a handy hint for the eclectic DJ

I've been sent Howie B's mix of Reich's 'Eight Lines', on Arthrob, and I like the way he's electronically tweaked things rather than adding a thumping beat for instant modernisation. The press release suggests that it can be 'incorporated into the more experimental (DJ) sets'. Well, for all you wannabe eclectic DJs, here's a three-track, millennium-spanning trick which involves this and two other records...

As the famous cellist, Pablo Casals once said, 'First comes Bach - then all the others' so start with one of JB's famous organ works, I favour his 'Fugue in E flat major'. Then leap forward a couple of hundred years to Olivier Messiaen's 'Dieu parmi nous' (from 'La Nativite', 1939) pitched up, or even at 45, for that extra 'minimalist' feel. Follow this with the Howie B remix of Reich. Voila! You will have covered 18th and 20th-century classicism whilst linking modern composition to contemporary electronic music. Easy, innit?

Warning: This amazing feat will undoubtedly clear any dancefloor and decrease your chances of securing a support slot on Norman Cook's next world tour.

know the score

I don't know when or why or how soundtracks became such essential listening this late in the millennium, but you surely won't dispute my claim, will you? Don't you know that the hippest listeners in town are those found flicking through the 'soundtracks' section of the record shops? Why not join them and discover the recently reissued delights of, say, 'Barbarella' and 'Get Carter', or 'Space Patrol' and 'You Only Live Twice'? It's better, believe me, than waiting for the next great D&B, Techno, Avant-rock blah blah release.

My latest acquisition from the world of sound scored for vision is David Shire's music to 'The Taking of Pelham One Two Three', a New York subway train hijack classic from 1974. I'd like to tell you the label, but mine's a bootleg (or a plain-sleeved promo for forthcoming release). The main thrill of this album is the title theme, which verges on the rare groove without being obviously 'funky'. The whole score is bolstered by big, tension-building, brassy statements which continually return to this theme, and in their jazzy mode, echo masters such as Lalo Shiffrin and Quincy Jones. It isn't music which transcends it's original context since it lacks either John Barry's lush tunefulness, or Morricone's classicism. But something about it's functionalism, divorced from the visual story, lends it an strangely endearing quality. It's music, not Music. Music made for one purpose, but in this format, available for others, such as brandishing the iron as if it were a shotgun and your wrinkled clothes are all that are left of an innocent subway passenger.

the joy of toytronic

Digital gremlins yabber and squeal, children speak, and tricky beats, along with breaks and lite-rave b-lines, bubble and squeak...welcome to Gimmik's six-track debut for Worm Interface. 'Toytronic' by name and nature, Martin Haidinger's music is a joyful noise which romps around, playfully plundering from such schools as Euro techno, melodic electronica and d&b. Apparently anarchic in the spirit of a child running wild, the reality of intelligent adult craftsmanship ensures that repeated plays reveal many hidden pleasures amongst the precision editing. 'Happy' music usually has the reverse effect on me, but Gimmik's triumph is to raise a smile with the smart application of modern scientific sound.

© Rob Lo March '99

birthday blues