Isis "'Oceanic' Remixes/Reinterpretations Volume IV" LP
[Robotic Empire]
I wouldn't say they've saved the best for last with the final portion of this series, but at the same time, this is another successful endeavor that, while not the best of the bunch, is as good a close as any for this rather epic undertaking. Venetian Snares opens with a revisitation of pieces selected from "The Beginning and the End" and creates a sparse concoction of looped and broken up Isis riffs along with some very nice manipulations of male and female vocals that places much more emphasis on the vocal elements and killer percussive fills than the original Isis work often did (notably the female singing, which is very prominent in this reworking). I'm honestly not really into the stuttered arrangements of the loops, as some of the more fluid uses of percussion and warped ambient guitar tones are far more interesting and enjoyable, but it's a decent song as a whole. Up next are the Destructo Swarmbots, whose "From: Sinking, To: Drowning" opens with rumbling low-end and fits of odd distortion before dropping out to a spacey, watery sort of ambience that carries along fairly calmly and consistently. It seems rather minimal, though there are some different sorts of glitchy sounds sweeping in and out as the volume swells to and fro. Later on some faint melodic drones start to sink in and mingle with the low-end rumbles, which is a great touch. And finally, Fennesz takes the whole of side B with a tweaking of the Isis track "Weight", opening with crispy sizzles of faint distortion that sort of break into harsher fits very briefly, whole hovering above a more consistent and ethereal sort of ambient landscape. This remains steady for a few minutes, as only minor changes take place with differing levels of depth and intensity building up over the course of a few minutes, gradually drawing to a close in much the same manner (only decreasing in volume/density rather than increasing, of course). As with the preceding releases in this series the LP is pressed on clear vinyl and comes housed in a minimal sleeve with high contrast metallic silver/white blotches. The backside of the sleeve has a circle die-cut out of it to reveal the tracklist on the label of the record itself (each record in the series has a different colored label, which is basically the only differentiation in packaging between each volume). As mentioned, this is definitely not the strongest of this series, as despite some excellent moments the Venetian Snares track is a little lacking for me, but the other two compositions definitely maintain a consistent and moving aesthetic that I really enjoy. So, each and every volume of this project is very nice and damn sure worth owning. Sadly for the sleepers they're all also well out of print, and you pretty much had to buy them right away to get copies. Here's to hoping a CD collection of all of this stuff will materialize at some point. The demand should definitely be there, and as a start to finish listen it would probably be pretty god damn impressive. I'm a big fan of these LP's, definitely. (7/10)
Running time - 20:00 (approximately), Tracks: 3
[Notable tracks: it's kind of a tie between the Destructo Swarmbots and Fennesz]
Robotic Empire - http://www.roboticempire.com

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