3 out of 5

Label: Rephlex

Producer: Astrobotnia

This is one of those albums that I think I’m supposed to think is amazing, but, uh, I don’t.  I think it’s incredibly good at moments, but takes a couple missteps and then wanders for too long to be great through and through.

We know now this is Aleksi from Ovuca.  We didn’t know at the time, we suspected, but it made the mystery of the compositions – and the gorgeous artwork – that much more alluring and seductive.  The beginning and ending to Part 01 maintain that sensibility, both tracks making use of surreal, out-of-context noise – fireworks for track 1, applause for the closer – to properly lull you into and then out of the dream that much of Part 01 weaves.  As track two bleeps into a sci-fi journey of IDM beats and deliciously echoed sounds, you feel like someone has made good on the Rephlex promise.  But our first hint of Ovuca’s playfulness – which here takes you out of the album – comes on ‘Everyone,’ with a robotic voice repeating threats and a mantra satan-worshipping.  It’s a good song, and you can justify that the mechanical vocal fits in with the theme, but its more herky jerky silly where it seemed like we were going for something a bit more outward-looking here.  Thankfully the album tips back into beats along the lines of track 2, and it maintains that sleepy eye-to-the-sky feel for a few more cuts before peeling back into ambient territory that absolutely brings early Aphex to mind.  Unfortunately, it thus draws the comparison to RDJ’s ambient work, which is, of course, a pretty high bar.  Those tracks, those albums (I’m sorta’ thinking of the ‘On’ EP or his first ambient collection) have a sense of scope and concept to them – like the whole piece is considered, not just a single texture – that doesn’t quite come across for the Astrobotnia version.  The songs are well done, and interesting, they just lack feeling, and so again, we’re sorta’ taken out of the album.

Nonetheless, Part 01 is a highlight of Rephlex’s varied catalogue, and once discovering who was behind it I gave it more credit, as it showed Aleksi pushing himself into new territory.