Paradroid/[A]Pendics Shuffle - Unclassified Computer Funk - 12" Vinyl

Orac is veering back into left field, starting a new series with this experimental split: four tracks for forward-reaching dance floors. You could call them house, and you could call them techno. Just don't call them minimal. We call them unclassified computer funk. Max Wendling aka Paradroid starts off the record. Member of the Boogizm crew, Max represents here with two tracks of his signature machine funk. The aircrash bureau is an action-packed and totally danceable gem, delivering in all departments: solid bass, acid sequences full of errors, synth stabs and tightly coded sounds at all compatible bit rates. Traversable nodes, in contrast, indulges in theatrical sampling styles. It starts out with a skeletal groove which reminds us of Doctor Rockit before settling down into a technoid bump anchored by a deep bassline. Tight drum machine patterns play ping pong over the top with wild eeps and atonal synth burbles. It's a curious logic, but we can deal with it, until the break anyway, when it sounds like Max accidentally shuts the drum machine off and after trying every button in the studio to bring it back in, somehow hits the right combination and succeeds, miraculously having kept the dance floor full. On the flip is a torrid [a]pendics.shuffle adventure. Struggling to arrest runaway percussion and control various oscillator leaks, Ken Gibson is singing through his special 'Trout Face' effect when an argument of a personal nature erupts with an unheard companion. Your rim job is the revealing name of this sweaty drum machine workout. Assembling and dissembling vocals, playing with the sequences and not letting his hand off the effects knobs, Ken manages to make it through this tricky episode in his studio. Torn feel starts out with some network interference finding its way through a drowsy beat, bubbling out in all directions. Precision funk constructed out of abstract noises creates some order in this madness, picks up the pace, then passes the baton to a malfunctioning vocal sample which eventually gives up, but not without a struggle.