Techno (すべて) charts

Review: Back in 2016, legendary Afrobeat drummer Tony Allen approached techno pioneer Jeff Mills with the idea of working together. A series of live gigs and off-the-radar studio sessions followed, with the first fruits of their joint efforts finally appearing on this must-have 10". As you'd expect, the duo's collaborative work combines Allen's traditional Nigerian polyrhythms, traditional Afrobeat instrumentation, and the far-sighted, sci-fi inspired electronic futurism that has always marked out Mills' work. The result is a quartet of cuts that could arguably be described as retro-futurist Afro-tech - all delay-laden beats, basslines and organs subtly sparring with gentle acid lines, Motor City electronics, beguiling deep space textures and shimmering, 31st century motifs. It's arguably Allen's stylistic contributions that dominate, but that's no bad thing.

Review: Berlin-based maverick Stefan Goldmann returns after the exquisite and sonically spatial delights of his Vector Rituals album with two more upbeat tracks that nod to techno but nevertheless steadfastly refuse to follow its stricter rules. 'In Aggregate' and flip track 'Carob' both throb and surge their way to the run out groove, eschewing the usual array of drum sounds to leave the rhythmic urgency down to other elements and turning the genre's on its head. Which is, let's face it, what he does best.

Review: Hoavi (Kirill Vasin) lends his services to Ghost Zvuk to deliver a disordered series of IDM 'Phases', which are intentionally numbered incorrectly throughout the record, as if to suggest something got broken in transit. That being said, these are remarkable textural explorations for the synaptic and deep-thinking listener; 'Phase 10' is an incessant repeat ricochet, sounding like the internal workings of a plasmic ball bouncing around inside a supernatural lead pipe; 'Phase 5' is more beat-driven, with pressurised pink noise bursts sounding to escape the alloyed confines of a ritual dubbing chamber.