Bpitch the German record label was set up in 2001 by Ellen Allien with the “function of being a platform for upcoming artists”. Since its creation Bpitch has established itself as a leader in the fast evolving tech-house sound. Kiki heralds from Finland and is one of the growing number of highly respected Scandinavian purveyors of decent electronic music. Kaiku (echo in Finnish) is the second album offering from the fair-haired house maestro.
I have to admit that I was absolutely delighted to get Kaiku in my electronic goody bag. Bpitch is a label that I like very very much and not only because Ellen Allien is a sexy female DJ that plays solidly good dance music, but also because of the music and the artists on their roster – Paul Kalkebrenner to name but one.
Kaiku is a wonderfully restrained dance album, with echoes of immense tranquillity in each track reminiscent, I am sure, of the sparse Finnish countryside. The opening track "Autumn Leaves" has a wonderfully restrained string part, set deep in the mix and begs to be turned up really, really loud. In fact all of
Kaiku just begs to be played very very loud, as all good dance records should be! Some will find the primitiveness and slow brooding nature of Kaiku immensely boring, to others it will be a gem in a very crowded minimal market. Track 3 "Good Voodoo" and Track 6 "Immortal" venture into real deep house territory with wonderfully sexy vocal stabs and echoes.
In all reality though, the album doesn’t really get anywhere. The tempo of the album remains the same throughout, and it is only at tracks 8 through 11 that the bar is raised to real tech-house level. Kiki is obviously a skilled producer, with each element in every track having their own space and their own dimension. Track 10 "Living on FFwd" is a lovely example of this and "Living on FFwd" is a deep minimal roller with a wonderfully understated trance string section to fit nicely on a layer of vocal samples.
If you want a lovely album that you can listen too on a Sunday morning while reading the paper, that in turn won’t raise your blood pressure, than get this album. If you want some almighty floor twisting tech-house rollers, then wait for the 12” and download singles. I certainly can’t wait for the singles and the dance-floors across Europe they will inevitably rock.
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Kiki - Kaiku
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