Make a Joyful Noise: State-of-the-Art Electronics from DiN Label
Ian Boddy on Echoes
Join the Echoes CD of the Club and get this album, iNDEX05 along with Jean-Michel Jarre’s Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise.
There used to be a thing called vision. It was the ability to create a concept and pursue it, no matter what the consequences or rewards. For some visionaries, like Steve Jobs and Kanye West, the financial and popular rewards are pretty vast. For others, the rewards come in a different form: from the satisfaction of pulling an idea out of the air, shaping and sculpting it, attenuating mood and motion, going where you’re not supposed to go.
Ian Boddy is one of those visionaries. He’s been making electronic music since 1980 when he released Images, his first cassette. (They’re coming back, you know.) He graduated to LPs and then CDs, growing as a musician and master of analog and digital synthesis. In 1999 he founded the DiN label, not only to release his own music, but also that of fellow electronic travelers. Across 49 albums, he’s cut a swath through electronic music, ranging from classic Berlin-school sequencers to all-out space abstractions and more.
Now he’s released his 50th CD, a compilation of DiN albums 41-49, and it’s a remarkable collection. More than just a promotion for his label, it’s a state-of-the-art manifesto of just how glorious pure electronic music can be.
Among other artists on the album are NODE and Dave Bessell (one of the members of Node.) Additional collaborations include Ian Boddy & Markus Reuter, Parallel Worlds & Dave Bessell, and Parallel Worlds & Self Oscillate (An unfortunate name, but good music.) A pairing of renowned Norwegian synth-guitarist Erik Wøllo with German synthesist Bernhard Wöstheinrich resulted in Wøllo’s most propulsive and rhythmically driven album ever, Weltenuhr. Two tracks from that are here.
Boddy couldn’t resist inserting his own completely atonal fractal freakout of amelodic music, “Tone Science.” It’s an exploration of pure synthesized sound – and the segue from “Tone 3” into Dave Bessell’s heavy metal synth groove on “Paradise Lost” is worth the trip. Boddy moves from the avant-garde to a supercharged rocker, “Cherry Bomb” by ARC, his collaboration with Redshift’s Mark Shreeve. It’s an analog synth, sequencer orgasm.
Across 18 tracks and 77 minutes, Boddy orchestrates an electronic symphony creating seamless transitions, that morph from one mode to another: from dark expanses to joyous trips, heavy grooves to heavenly spaces.
If you’re looking for a perfect electronic album, you don’t need to venture further that DiN50, INDEX05.
Join the Echoes CD of the Club and get this album, iNDEX05 along with Jean-Michel Jarre’s Electronica 2: The Heart of Noise.
~John Diliberto