3 out of 5

Label: Warp

Produced by: Richard D. James

Two RDJ “remixes” of On, which are, of course, light years away from the original, then two mixes that should appeal to fans of the remixers, but are otherwise pretty slight.

Opener D-Scape is, technically, fascinating: while On’s ambience is glittery; a Springtime celebration, D-Scape reduces it to dusk – take out the joy of sunlight filtering through trees and give us the quiet nervousness of insects buzzing. The xylophone like synth connects it to the source, but otherwise, this is a nervous, open-ended piece of work that would not be out of place on Ambient Works Volume II. Now… is that what you’re expecting / looking for when buying a set of On remixes? Hard to say. It’s also a strange choice for an opener. But it’s RDJ.

Closer On (28 Mix) goes even further with this, completely moving us into white noise ambience, advancing the timeline of the day to the pitch of night. I’m sure there’s something here that is a remix of On, but I’m not sharp enough to tell you what that is.

I think a full single of mixes like these would have been pretty great, crossing the line into so unexpected that it becomes compelling. But they’re instead sandwiched around two very typical remixes: Reload streamlines the track into standard 90s ambient, rather taking out most of the flavor to my ears but also providing something that fans of more gentle ambient – versus On’s bounce – might appreciate; more in line with Ambient Volume I, I suppose. u-Ziq pretty much turns it into a u-Ziq track, but does hold on to the original’s energy and vibes, just gives it more a shuffly, grooving backbone beat. Definitely a solid remix.

…But also definitely a weird set overall.