- After the comparative lightness offered up on Workshop 10's twisted disco theme, the label's eleventh instalment turns back towards the dankest depths of freak show house for a late night mongout. The three deep cuts on Workshop 11 all slog along with a druggy charisma at a pace barely capable of carrying a pulse.
Even Tuell delivers perhaps the most pleasant offering on the A side, making use of a repetitive bassline to lead a dozing, shuffly dance through a subtly uplifting string pattern and clicky analogue drums. A gentle build and lack of release lends the track an ethereal tension capable of simultaneously inducing a sense of madness and wired catharsis.
For fans already familiar with Tuell's esoterica, Workshop 11's most exciting moments come courtesy of label newcomers Madteo and Midnightopera, who both turn in brooding numbers laden with a blase menace. Madteo's horror score vocal breathes down the neck of its unwitting victim, muttering paranoiac threats before unleashing a huge bass flex to deal the murder blow. It's a unique and rattling dub house hybrid capable of building an uncompromisingly brutal atmosphere should any DJ be brave enough to try and tame it on a big system.
Midnightopera's debut could be a field recording taken directly from the crypt of a long-lost phantom factory. Inaudible conversations get lost amidst a dubby atmospheric, too weary to be affected by the menace imposed by the whirring analogue machinery busily running in the foreground. A bass drum pedal even creaks in desperate need of oil, a nuance perfectly complementary to the arid taste in the mouths of the cranky afterhours clubbers it's aimed at.
トラックリスト A Even Tuell - Untitled
B1 Madteo - Untitled
B2 Midnightopera - Untitled