- Eric Dulan has said that one of his alter-egos, Differ-Ent, is the "dark side" of his more famous alias, DJ Bone. This musical distinction is simple to grasp. As DJ Bone, Dulan churns out tough and tracky techno like 2014's "Detroit Is Hard," which seemed built for his three-deck DJ sets. The music he makes as Differ-Ent has been more complex and cerebral, as heard on last year's It's Good To Be Differ-Ent, his first LP under that alias. Though that album lacked funky floor-fillers like, say, 2008's "No Sleep (True To Da Roots)," its experimental twists and turns made it more satisfying than the straight-ahead techno of his last DJ Bone album, 2007's Out Of Knowhere.
DJ Bone's latest LP, A Piece Of Beyond, shows the difference between these two projects getting smaller. A few tracks, like "Dreamers 9" and "Sweat," stick rigidly to the DJ Bone template: linear, loop-based techno. For the most part, though, Dulan's blunt instruments seem to have gained unusual depth and polish. The kick drums still hit hard, even on the album's most poignant track, "R.I.P.," featuring the late Aaron Carl's tender vocals. If that one comes as a surprise, the same can't be said of some other tracks. A couple recall elements of Carl Craig ("Freestyle") and Drexciya ("Lectronimo"), but neither offers a fresh take on those sounds.
Compared to It's Good to Be Differ-Ent, most of A Piece Of Beyond sounds a bit safe. There's a four-track sequence, however, that contains the most daring and diverse music Dulan has produced in any guise. "The Stalker" oscillates between heads-down techno and rousing airborne synths. "Power Outage" mimics circuitry going into meltdown. "The Chase"'s breakbeat broadsides are followed by "All My Heart"'s soaring synths and "I love you" vocal sample, which all surge like a pure serotonin rush. It's during this section that Dulan keeps his light and dark sides in balance, and where he shows he can be as much of a force in the studio as he is in the DJ booth.
Tracklist01. It Begins
02. The Stalker
03. Power Outage
04. The Chase
05. Dreamers 9
06. All My Heart
07. Sweat
08. Freestyle
09. R.I.P. feat. Aaron-Carl
10. Lectronimo
11. Workings Of The Inner Circle
12. Tell The Story