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John Digweed - Transitions Vol 2
(Renaissance)
Release Date: January 0th, 2007
Reviewed: 3/10
John Digweed returns with the second instalment of his biannual Transitions series on Renaissance; a compilation designed to provide a snapshot of his favoured material of the moment. The opening track, Digweed’s own edit of Abyss ‘Mind Games’, is dark and quirky – the sort of track he used to champion on his Kiss FM show. The deep progressive leads and twisted keys lend it enough to work in smoky club without ever crossing over into a proper dancefloor number. Abyss feature again with the following track, ‘Dreamer’, a track that begins with the type of electro bleeps and squeaks that are the hallmark of Transitions Vol 2. The gentle keys and building riff of the breakdown lend themselves perfectly to the title but these atmospherics have already been tarnished by the first part of the piece. A slightly clumsy mix leads us into a Guy Gerber remix of ‘Dana’ by Chaim, another squeaky track that bubbles away unobtrusively. A danceable groove emerges on Joakim’s remix of the Balearic ‘Camino del Sol’ from Antena (originally released in 1982), but this is snuffed out by some irritating reverbed effects in the latter part of the piece. Williams ‘The Shivering’ is a reminder of the old Digweed; a rumbling piece of broody music with a deep bassline that hangs like a storm cloud, twisted metallic synths and squelching acid hooks. That, as they say, is that as the CD reverts to type with succession of bland minimal/electro efforts, each seemingly trying to outdo each other with their kooky effects and scatter bomb approach to composition. Few stand out, save perhaps for some interesting melodies in Dirk Technic’s ‘I Love You’ although these, like Antena’s before them, are soon overpowered, this time swamped by a fairly dire arpeggio riff. There is little to say about the rest of the tracks. Compilations need two vital ingredients to work. The first is, of course, great music with a timeless appeal. The second is programming: the ability to make a set exceed the sum of its parts. On both fronts, Transitions Vol 2 is lacking. The music is little more than bland minimal electro, mostly devoid of worthwhile melody or groove. Williams and Abyss provide some light in this dark tunnel but the remaining tracks mush together in grey blandness like melting snow on a road. In addition, along with Digweed’s change in musical course, has come an apparent inability to build a set across a CD. Maybe it is the music he uses or just a general malaise, but either way, something isn’t right. The press release refers to the CD’s shift from 124bpm to 129bpm across its 70 minute duration as ‘flawless programming’; if slowly increasing the pitch across a set now counts as set-building, the dance music scene is in a very sorry state. Given that this is the same man who put together so many legendary Northern Exposure, Renaissance and Global Underground compilations in the past, we can only hope that his demise is temporary. In the meantime, fans of the old John Digweed should steer well clear of this compilation.
Simon Ross [09-Jan-2007]
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