seven

This is Celluloïd Mata's first full-length release on Ant-Zen, and as far as I can hear they're right at home. In a scene saturated with some pretty strong trends, Sable manages to put a unique spin on things, with engaging, hypnotic results. The formula is pretty basic, when you break it right down, but the outcome is far more than the sum of its parts. There is a soul at work here, that little something that makes each track click with an extra breath of life.

This is primarily percussive music -- textured, repetitive beats backed with patterned melodies and brief soundscapes that drive the mechanical rhythms with a glint of emotion. "Code," one of the longer tracks on the disc, features layers of relaxed, matter-of-fact beats laced with subtle ringing pitches that give the impression of a vast backdrop. Simple, but mesmerizing.

"We Sync" is quite strange; purely textural to begin with, like a static charged anthill, the track then evolves into an odd, whispered, anecdotal tale that constantly looses me every time I try to follow what's being said. "Shell" serves up a heavy dose of pounding beats with intermittent squeals that give them a strange illusion of feeling squeaky, whereas the final track, "Modulation in Sync," lacks beats entirely, capping off the disc with soothing, linear strings of warm tones blowing over a hazy, manipulated voice.

Rhythmic, tribal music that is caught in flux somewhere between the primal urges of raw percussion and the unlimited sounds of a fragmented computer age. How's that for avoiding using the words 'power noise'? For more info and a handful of mp3s from past releases check out the Celluloïd Mata website.