- Think of turntablism and the macho posturing of hip-hop types such as the Scratch Perverts spring to mind. Even experimental artists such as Q-Bert can never really escape the same testosterone template set down by Grandmaster Flash et al. But Philip Jeck is different. His interest in turntables begins where most people's stops: at the last bit of the record and with vinyl which has been chucked in the bin.
What Jeck does is to turn the ends of records into engaging, multi-layered electronica. He samples and loops the sound of the needle hitting the runout groove, or where the record is scratched and keeps repeating. He also uses two record players from the early ‘60s (so they have 33, 45 and 78 and 16 settings) to play vinyl which comes from donation bins or rubbish heaps. An old Casio synth is the other accompaniment and the layers are filtered through a mixer and guitar pedal for effects.
Add to this Jeck's touch and the 45 minutes of Sand end up rather like listening to someone tuning a radio whilst you're semi-anaesthetised. Sounds drift in and out of your ear, and are subject to extensive echoing and delay, leaving you unsure of what they are. By my reckoning, there's a plethora of chimes, chains jangling, ship funnels and WW2 news broadcasts, but you can't be sure.
The seven songs lend themselves to mind-wandering and stretch your imagination to conjure whatever it wants, which makes Sand an immersive and engrossing listen. At the core of the tracks is the loop, but not in the sense of how it works in dance music. You can just about trace Jeck's early interest in the percussive tracks of ‘70s New York DJs Walter Gibbons, Larry Levan and Shep Pettibone, but 30 years on Jeck's loops expand, soar, and proclaim rather than simply propping up a vocal house diva.
Jeck waited three-and-a-half years between his last album 7 and Sand: the delay was because he felt dissatisfied with what he was producing. It was worth the wait. Sand is quite possibly his best work and definitely his most intense album to date. He reaches unprecedented levels of ferocity on the three tracks which make use of horns. 'Fanfares Over', in particular is enormously uplifting. I've never been inside a pan of water when it's being slowly boiled, but I imagine that's what the first half of the song sounds like. The second half morphs into what sounds like a loop of an aeroplane going overhead, which inflates further and further as fanning synths swarm that both disorientate and delight. By the end of the track I realised I spent the entire 11 minutes staring at a tree.
トラックリスト01 Unveiled
02 Chime Again
03 Fanfares
04 Shining
05 Fanfares Forward
06 Residue
07 Fanfares Over