Various Artists - Mezzotinto 14

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  • Estroe is one of those producers whose occasional flashes of brilliance (‘Driven’) suggest an artist who’s capable of great things. Likewise, French label Mezzotinto looked set for a bright future with their early releases by Mark August and Artificial Latvamäki. I wish I could say that Mezzotinto 14 has brought either promise of greatness closer to fruition, but unfortunately, what we have here is a fairly lackluster three-tracker with one decent tune and two dull, forgettable ones. The really bad news comes from Martin Skogehall, whose ‘Congos’ is a boring, funkless six and sum minutes of treading water. I have a playlist on my mp3 player called ‘neunovaneauveaunew’, which I put all recent EPs into and let shuffle while I’m doing dishes and so forth. Invariably, whenever this track comes on, I have to storm into the room, remove my soapy gloves, and hit skip. Rodrigo Soria’s ‘Tribo’ is a little better, presenting a techno snorkel trip through a sub-surface world full of aqueous burbles, slaps and gulps. It’s fine as far as it goes, but it’s no sooner over than forgotten. Enter Estroe to save the day, with a storming minimal tech-houser redolent of Daniel Stefanik’s ‘The Bells’ or other early catalogue Mobilee. It’s a nice track with plenty of push and twitch, and almost enough to save the EP. Given that this is a digital release, track-by-track downloads might be possible, in which case, check out Estroe’s track (if you’re already a fan). If you’re not familiar with her work, start with the ‘Driven’ EP on Connaisseur and give this one a big fat miss.
  • Tracklist
      1 Estroe - Updraft 2 Martin Skogehall - Kongos 3 Rodrigo Soria - Tribo
RA