- Ricardo Villalobos. Chile. ‘Ground-breaking’. Ketamine. ‘Genius’. DC10. Richie Hawtin. Etc.
‘Seive’ sounds like cockroaches raving. They rub their spindly, spiky limbs together in insect glee and their shiny brown bodies pile up in mounds next to assorted nuggets of abandoned takeaway food. Eventually all the roaches line up and begin a back and forth two-step, in sync, looking set to take over the world the way we all know they eventually will. It’s an exhilarating yet slightly sickening sight. They spread their wings and leap into the air (only the female ones can fly). A bored café owner sweeps the area clean.
Translation: it’s fucking weird, but you can definitely dance to it, unlike some of Ricardo’s other recent work. And when I say weird I mean totally sweet.
The lower-profile Henrik Schwarz remixes his 2002 hit ‘Jimis’ on the other side, removing the squealing guitar of the original. Now this is a bit like remixing ‘Laffy Taffy’ without the fingersnaps and could easily have resulted in something utterly boring. However the end result is enjoyable steamtrain techno – relentlessly chugging forward with an old-school Detroit riff providing the energy and pressure-building metallic clangs adding a bit of atmosphere. You could probably think of a dozen tunes that sound very similar but when we’re talking classic Detroit-style techno like this that’s not really a criticism.