safe & sound

Hi there, Brandon here. I'm not big on self-promotion, but it's probably appropriate to link here:

http://dustedmagazine.com/reviews/4110

In my free time, I write record reviews for Dusted, an online music magazine. The above link goes to my latest piece, a review of Justus Köhncke's album Safe and Sound. If asked to describe it briefly, I would probably say that it's an ambitious house record. Although it has some very pop moments, it's distinct from the crossover eurodisco of Daft Punk/Justice in that it doesn't have much to orient American/British listeners--no recognizable samples, familiar motifs, or pop-cultural references.

It was released by the Cologne-based label Kompakt, which is known as the premier label for "minimal house," a stripped-down take on 4/4 electronic dance music. Köhncke's known for being a pop-leaning producer, and a lot of the tracks on this album are stacked with bright keyboards and mock-wistful melodies. The streaming track on the review page is one of my favorite songs on this album, "Feuerland." Here, Köhncke covers a track by Michael Rother, best known as the guitar player in the innovative German duo Neu! Rother was a key musician in the extremely fertile post-WWII German music scene, a movement retrospectively called Krautrock.

The track begins with an electronic facsimile of one of Krautrock's most recognizable elements: Neu!'s chugging motorik beat, a parent to what would eventually become house and techno. The cover develops much like the languid original, with melodies and counter-melodies introduced in turn. Even though Köhncke uses raw-sounding synthesizers where Rother used drifting guitars, the song's mood remains calm. There's no edge to Köhncke's music, and this album often conveys a feeling close to those communicated by ambient music (another Krautrock by-product). On a structural level, as I mention in the review, this is entirely rooted in house music. It also happens to be rooted in the things that its nominal genre is rooted in.