It’Cetera

A tricky one this. Prog sounds wonderful at the moment, and the prospect of a second album from these two would arouse trainspotters in a way only other trainspotters could understand. The reality though is something a little less…. erm… a little less something. Rise straddles energetic progressive and uplifting morning psychedelia, largely feeling like a more flowing, free Silicon Sound, before a rather tricky chord change comes in at the end, which for my money spoils the vibe a little. Recent single Sex, Drugs… is a lovely piece of work with a dirty, funky bassline providing the backbone for a host of progressive sweeps and tricks. It’s phatter than yo mama, and y’all know how phat yo mama be. Word. I Want To Feel sounds like a more psychedelic Underworld: an aggressive rhythm section meshes with a punky vocal, with wonderful stabs and topends holding it all together. Got What It Takes is a great beast of a slab of pounding tech-trance, and definite brainfood for the discerning progressive DJs out there. It’s hard and somewhat menacing – it would create an insane atmosphere on the dancefloor… that smoke machine would look nothing short of evil. Got What It Takes is a phenomenal record, slowing things down to a breezy 126. It’s funky, it’s spunky, it’s smooth and it’s groovy. Nothing it over-emphasised, and nothing is forced into going where it doesn’t want to… in short it’s a nigh on perfect bit of prog. Mi Corazon pushes things up a notch, an almost-psytrance bottomend with stuttered, platypus-y sounds across the topend. Going Down sees them pick up the funk again, the percussion here is straight outta deep tribal, and the sounds around it have shades of Detroit, giving a final atmosphere of a Cyclotron-era-Wizzy dystopian city, gaslit and with New York steam rising from the streets. Party takes the same cityscape, focuses in on a sleazy club somewhere downtown, and drenches it in topend poke, midrange flurry and bottomend oomph. Finally House For My Spouse is a loopus-bothering 130bpm starsky-heavy funkathon… inventive, but it sounds rather limp. I love this for the sound that the guys have got: ruthlessly original, so much so that in some places it sounds like they may have stumbled on a new genre. It lacks that little special something that makes it a loveable and essential purchase, and some won’t like the way it so boldly fuses elements of psytrance and house, frequently landing on the same tuff-discoid sound. At the end of the day it’s an interesting album, but one which leaves psyreviews largely confused.