Nosaj Thing - Drift [Album]
 

Jason Chung is Nosaj Thing and he's been putting himself about a bit of late. What with a regular spot at Low End Theory (a club night in his hometown of LA), remixing friend and label mate Flying Lotus and now releasing his debut long player Drift he's one busy chap.

Listening to this album makes me wish I still smoked weed. This is a collection of hip hop beats run over with a collection of synths and sound effects creating a sometimes cold, sparse and naggingly incomplete work. It is more like a framework or a backdrop in need of a vocal artist to make sense of it all. There in lies the drawback of letting the synths do all the talking.

That's not to say this is a poor album. Not at all - 'Coat of Arms' is effectively haunting but at the same time has a nice urgent techno blip over the top and a good old fashioned hand clap keeping things moving along whilst '1010' picks up the tempo some but does on occasion sound like a Daft Punk off-cut with its heavily engineered keys.

'1685/Bach' gets you involved with a distorted stomp along thing going on but never really gets anywhere, which is the fundamental flaw of Drift. It is interesting to a point with some involving sections but it all washes over too easily. I can't help but feel that right now out there somewhere - most likely Vegas - a 'cool' young magician is fannying about on stage to this music doing pointless things to a tiger with a sword.

Closer 'Lords' is what happens when electronic music goes to church - all sampled choirs and echoey church sounds but like many of the tracks here it just fades to nothing. There is a distinct lack of narrative and cohesion running through the album and it's a real shame because there is promise galore here and signs of better things to come.

Sorry Nosaj, it's not a bad first effort but if it's a chunk of experimental electronica with a hip hop flavour you're after then you still can't do better than those Boards of Canada.

Nosaj Thing - LAtronica with a Hip Hop beat.

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift (Alpha Pup)
 

Totally disagree with this, you can't compare Nosaj to Boards of canada, they are totally different. This guy is an extremly good producer, some of the best production of 09 so far and has come up with a quality album. Listen to his remix of Radiohead - Reckoner and you will see what i mean.

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift (Alpha Pup)
 

How come noone edited this before it went live?

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift [Album]
 

Why what was wrong with it?

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift (Alpha Pup)
 

I'll certainly check it out but the fact is that remix wasn't on the album so I can't take it into consideration now, can I. Besides, it's a remix, which means he's starting from a point of someone else's brilliance to begin with.
That was the funny thing about the production - he's lorded as this great producer and it just sounded cheap to me. Like '80's horror music cheap. One man in a bedroom cheap.
Never said it was a bad album, just found it dull.
And it's not really fair to compare anyone to Boards of Canada really, seeing as they are the best at what they do.

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift (Alpha Pup)
 

The title was wrong and the photo hadn't been edited even though it was approved. It's alright i was just being picky.

Haha ok fair enough. Thats true about boards of CAnada, those guys make some unreal tunes

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift (Alpha Pup)
 

I agree with Mike here some times I am not sure people are actually reading
through these reviews and editing it properly. There are loads that get
approved that I need to go in later and re-edit. What can we do about this?

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift [Album]
 

All retake English ;)

Just kidding, I think it's just a time issue - we need more editors. Editing something properly takes time, certainly with some reviews. Perhaps this review was a victim of the writer's reputation, in that I find Burt's reivews tend not to need much editing, if any at all. Perhaps I had too much faith in him and he let me down (just kidding Burt).

Thing is, I am sure the title and picture haven't changed since I approved it. What changed exactly?

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift [Album]
 

It was just the title and byline.

Title was:
Nosaj Thing - Drift (Alpha Pup)


Blyline was:

" LAtronica with a Hip Hop beat. "



Again i was just being picky about it!

Re: Nosaj Thing - Drift [Album]
 

I'm sorry, but I totally disagree with this review. Not only does it have an abundance of ill-informed facts, but it's downright ridiculous comparing Nosaj to Boards of Canada, who are coming at production from a completely different place and perspective. Nosaj himself has stated in multiple interviews I've read that the album is supposed to be cinematic in feel, which is obviously something that you, reviewer, can't appreciate. To each his own, though. Props to Nosaj, though...can't think of a producer out there right now doing such game-changing work that's for one, not sample-based, and two, not a straight Dilla rip.