Fabric: Cat. # fabric95
Released September 2009

Track List:
1. Baeka - Right At It (Michel Cleis Deeper Remix)
2. Radio Slave - DDB
3. Radio Slave - I Don’t Need A Cure For This
4. Dance Disorder - My Time (Radio Slave’s Rekids Tribe Remix)
5. Brothers’ Vibe - Platter Sugar
6. Spencer Parker - The Beginning (Michel Cleis Remix)
7. Nina Kraviz - Pain In The Ass
8. DJ Boola - Balada Redo
9. Radio Slave - Koma Koma (Steve Lawler Remix)
10. Spencer Parker - My Heart (Daniel Sanchez Easy Noise Remix)
11. Michel Cleis featuring Totó La Momposina - La Mezcla
12. 2000 & One - Wan Poku Moro
13. Nate Williams - Maximum Overload (Roy's Death Wish Mix)


IN BRIEF: Exactly what you’d expect.

So this one’s kind of late, and, in light of the Fabric series having recently reached the 50th edition of its long history (100th, if you include the FabricLive series alongside it!), makes talking about number forty-eight seem highly inconsequential at this point. Yet surely there’s something to be said about Radio Slave contributing, right? After all, Matthew Edwards has been a hot commodity these last few years, building his steadily rising star on the basis of an endless stream of singles and remixes that, er, always have the feeling of being endlessly looped.

Therein lays the problem though. Having firmly established his place as a producer with a limited, if effective, signature sound, Edwards’ name has cooled off in the clubbing conscious. Without even looking at a tracklist, someone even vaguely familiar with Radio Slave material will have a good idea what a Fabric release with his name on it will sound like. What could have been a thrilling addition to the series’ legacy a couple years back now seems safe and predictable.

Sure enough, Fabric 48 holds few surprises. The opening begins with a few deep cuts, recalling the sort of sound prog DJs were playing around 2002. Then, we move into tribal-house territory, which is interesting merely for the fact this stuff is in vogue again after some five-to-ten years of being not. A quick detour into dull ketamine-house with Nina Kraviz’ Pain In The Ass, then back into the tech-grooves, finally throwing in a few contemporary ‘gimmick-house’ cuts towards the end; a Latin-sample here, a soul-speech there… not all that contemporary, to be honest, as we’ve heard gimmicks like these for years now.

And frankly, Edwards’ set is summed up as much. You could probably walk into a used music shop and find a DJ mix CD from up to fifteen years ago that would sound remarkably similar to much of what Edwards plays here. No, this isn’t a bad thing, as his set is mostly enjoyable, the sort of dance music you can mindlessly bob your head along to; unfortunately, it’s also redundant. Unless you can’t get enough of this deep-tech-tribal-etc. house sound, such that you just have to have every release the genre offers, there isn’t much incentive to pick this up. You would be just as well off downloading a live-set for free.

Supposedly, Edwards intended this to be taken as such, a representative of what you’re likely to hear at a club he’s playing at. I can buy into that, as there isn’t any kind of musical narrative going on here. It simply starts, let’s the energy gradually grow, and simply ends, taking in few variations of tech house along the way. You can start this CD at any point and not have missed anything significant; or end it at any point for that matter. It’s like being able to leave the dance floor to get a drink or go for a smoke, secure in the knowledge the DJ isn’t going to memorably switch things up in the meantime.

Or, if he does, it’ll be a fall back on a worn-out anthem -in this case, La Mezcla. For whatever reason, this was one of the biggest tracks of 2009. As far as I can tell, it’s just Heater Part 2: Flute Boogaloo; the melody is apparently Spanish in origin, but I keep hearing the words to Frère Jacques whenever that flute starts bleating. It’s a fun little tune once in a while, though definitely not something you’d want to hear over and over and over once the novelty of the sample wears thin.

Even if you have a fondness for this music, Fabric 48 is hard to get terribly enthusiastic over. I’m just repeating myself in calling this safe and predictable but Edwards hasn’t given me much to work with here. Such seems to be the case with the Fabric series as a whole lately though. Aside from a few occasional standouts, what was once a leader in the DJ mix field has settled into something of a ‘Global Underground syndrome’: relying on high-profile names to deliver merely adequate DJ mixes to the consumer; unremarkably consistent. Radio Slave’s contribution is just another addition to this trend, and if you’re still wondering why I’m even bothering to review this CD four months after it hit the streets, it only confirms my point.


ACE TRACKS:
Nothing really stood out as a highlight.


Written by Sykonee, 2010, for Electronic Music Critic. © All rights reserved.

Title: Fabric 48: Radio Slave
Category: Compilations/DJ Mixes
Sub Category: House
Reviewer: Sykonee
Related Link: Fabric London
Added: January 20th 2010
Viewed: 445 Times
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