T.E.W. - Eighteen

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  • In their podcasts as well as their records, Electronique.it has a strong techno aesthetic—ethereal, futuristic and experimentally inclined. Their latest EP glimpses into the world of the sound's progenitors with two outtakes from Giampiero Fagiolo and Simone Renghi, both recorded in Rome in the mid-'90s. T.E.W.—Traveling Into Esoteric World—are credited as an important influence on the wave of Italian producers that would follow, and Eighteen, their first archival release, makes it obvious why. "Grass 2," from 1997, is right out of the early Aphex playbook. The heavy-duty drums feel industrial but padded enough to sound pretty. They're flanked by slow-motion strings and sticky synth textures, which wiggle about like condensation falling off the chilly synth lead. By the end it's almost sickly sweet, with layers and layers of happy-go-lucky synth. "Prepostpheo" uses the same elements (an acid bassline, pirouetting synths) to much trippier effect, floating through space before landing somewhere on the weirder end of classic Detroit techno. It's a foreshadow to the hypnotic techno coming out of Italy today, but there's also a curious beauty to T.E.W.'s work—similar to the eerie glow that made peak-era IDM so bewitching—that remains harder to imitate.
  • Tracklist
      A1 Grass 2 B1 Prepostpheo
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