That Berlin-based producer Sebastian Genz has declared hip-hop and turntablism his first musical love is audible in every weathered house beat on his new album. Each restrained hi-hat gently dusts off the ten deep house numbers that settle comfortably into your veins with enough deceleration, and wouldn’t mind if we all simply took a moment to breathe.
Between delicate piano melodies, Four Tet-esque folktronica meditation and relaxed repetition, this unruffled, resting-pulse-friendly house design pulses at a tempo that offers enough space to absorb every subtlety of the record at leisure. Take the vinyl lessons on »The Cut«, for instance. An ancient voice recording from an instructional video of colourless television days holds forth behind a drowsy Sunday afternoon beat, explaining everything about record grooves, pressing and vinyl production – an educational moment on an album that otherwise asks very little of us except to please.
There are plenty of other highlights. »Island Dreams« briefly awakens memories of the days when you’d brazenly enter nu jazz into iTunes genre tags, while the cautiously prancing »A Way Out« bleeps its way groove-first into your legs.
Into The Distance
