Various Artists - Veros Artis Volume 1

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  • The nascent London-based Dissident label has recently cultivated a good deal of attention by way of highly limited pressings combined with a consistently sophisticated and diverse output. Veros Artis Vol. 1 is the label's inaugural CD effort, a resurrection of now-unavailable material which itself is limited to 1,000 copies, and showcases the label's ability to resolutely maintain a broad aesthetic cohesion while cutting across everything from cosmic/Italo to acidic house. The ten tracks gathered here are marked by a strong retro-analog mood: you'd be hard-pressed to detect the touch of a laptop or software plug-in. Compositional structure throughout is largely governed by a production mindset eschewing novel flair or surprise for the careful and crafted elaboration of single idea. It's a fine wine approach to white label electronic music. The track order of Veros Artis is impeccable, with each track neatly dovetailing into the next to arc an album-long parabola from human-inflected disco to the furthest regions of robotic techno and back again. It's more of a mix than a compilation, really, and a testament to label control as a thoughtful, curatorial process. The opener from Gatto Fritto, a delightful space disco chugger, cruises on a low-lumbering quarter-bass riff smoothly into the wobbly, hypnotic throb of Helium Robots' "Metallic Dawn," which then opens up into the spinning-wheel arpeggios of Gweilo's "Acolyte." After some more abrasive techno cuts, label head Andy Blake appears as Control Voltage, whose electro work-out "2" is caught in some vicious rhythmic cross-currents, producing a highly dynamic excursion by means of a stripped, 808-heavy palette. Whirring, dense drum layers cluster together to gather reciprocal momentum before spooling away from one another without warning, producing the kind of swervey disorientation one associates with the vehicular ascent of a hairpin mountain road. Two slow-burn rodeo techno romps follow, the latter being the work of Ali Renault, half of Italo disco duo Heartbreak. "Tropical Warrior," composed by Heartbreak's other member, Sebastian Muravchik, picks up the former's horny bullrider groove and rides it into some neon Miami Vice glitz, lighting up a trace of human emotion at the end of a merciless techno tunnel. Finally, along with "2," the other epic peak here is the closing gem, "False Energy" by Binary Chaffinch, reportedly the labor of Milo, the drummer from Chrome Hoof. It's a long-form alien emanation of electronic disco which in the course of some eleven minutes manages to keep its relentless groove while pulling all sorts of hard wtf-left turns—female vocals, live drum fills, and all manner of synthesizer bursts fly by like dreamy nocturnal ephemera. To be sure, a high mark in recent out-disco production, and an ideal finishing track, making circular reference to the disco inflections of Gatto Fritto's opener while managing to land the compilation's sonic excursion deep in uncharted territory.
  • Tracklist
      01. Gatto Fritto - Clem's Bounce 02. Helium Robots - Metallic Dawn 03. Gweilo - Acolyte 04. Invincible Scum - House Of The Rising Scum 05. Kruton - Hollow Demon 06. Control Voltage - 2 07. S.C.S. - Model Specific 08. Ali Renault - Our World Is... 09. Muravchix - Tropical Warrior 10. Binary Chaffinch - False Energy
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