Digitaline - Honolulu

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  • It's been a busy year for Digitaline. In March, the duo of Laurent Bovey and Gregory Poncet released Cadenza's debut artist album, Anticlockwise, and this 17-minute track, backed by a remix by Luciano, is the group's first 12" in nearly two years. Bovey and Poncet are hardly slow workers, though: they simply prefer to play live, honing their hypnotic tracks in the club rather than releasing them. That much is apparent from the runout grooves: both Digitaline and Luciano's tracks simply stop in mid-sentence, ready to play into infinity or whenever the club finally closes (whichever comes first). They're DJ tools, first and foremost, and whatever criticism leveled at seconds – or minutes – of stasis is simply a case of misguided home listeners waiting for a payoff that'll never come. Digitaline's version of 'Honolulu' is subtitled 'Kamehameha I,' a reference to the man who conquered – and united – the Hawaiian Islands in the 19th century, while Luciano's remix is a tribute to Liliuokalani, the republic's last Queen. That dichotomy is an easy way of understanding the two tracks: Digitaline's mix is a stiff and muscular one, relying on Polynesian drums and a metallic theme to give it a hint of funkiness; Luciano's is more sensuous, luxuriating for huge lengths of time on the digital delay of a snare drum or a lightly rolled tom. Both, at the end of the day, are exactly the sort of thing you'd expect from Cadenza, but certainly not the finest moment from either artist. That's to be expected, as the label has rapidly grown over the past year and releases have been fast and furious over the past twelve months. What this increased workrate will mean for the label's original group of Swiss cohorts is anyone's guess, but something tells me we'll be seeing a lot more of Digitaline. And a lot sooner.
  • Tracklist
      A Honolulu (Digitaline’s Kamehameha I.) B Honolulu (Luciano’s Liliuokalani Remix)
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