The hints are that ALI HURELL (16/06/78-10/05/06, AKA THE JIVE INSPECTOR) was a restless musician. The six tracks of soulful dance electronica on this twelve inch vinyl issue might be hard to find by now, but there is something about them that has kept nudging into my play lists ever since I first got the nice heavy vinyl review copy many weeks ago.
Dying unexpectedly in unexplained circumstances a month short of his 28th birthday, Ali had been living as a monk and recording in a Monastery in Thailand. This release from micro-lable Alternative Blueprint is offered as a tribute to and an expression of a short but intense life.
Track A1 "VagDB" unveils a unique mixture of techno beats and chilled out choir harmonies. At A2, "Ticklin" opens with bleeping monotony and harsh crash cymbals. There's a little scratchiness … and then those long low notes and a slower tempo seeps in underneath. Eventually the chill takes over, as some kind of spiritual redemption (not escape) within the clamour of industrial techno.
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"Delayed Bliss" looks for a similarl escape. Chants and small bells interweave heavy dub elements. It stays restless. The second side of the vinyl opens with "I Don’t Mind This Feeling" at B1. It's a much more worldly, upbeat and urgent tune. It has a hint of desperate lust about it that is uneasy and yearning rather than seductive. The lyric morphs into "I can’t stand this feeling".
B2, "Retro Bass Mania" is more of a sketch, waiting to be adopted in to a bigger work. B3, "Acidhop" is similarly minimalist, but more developed, wandering succesfully off the beat into scary corners, bumping into some big bass notes and plenty of sharp twisting sounds along the way.
www.alternativeblueprint.com
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