Alex Israel - Gaz-13 [MP3]
Given the sheer volume of recorded music which has arisen since the invention of carbon pressing, I’d think that repetition in form or sound is relatively inevitable these days. To many, in fact, the guitar’s been used in such a multitude of ways that it can no longer offer us as listeners anything new. And while 150 years of recorded instruments have left some musicians baffled as regards to where they can go, a measly 30 years of techno and house also seem to have elicited stacks of uninteresting funky house and copy after copy of derivative 128 bpm techno. However, all is not lost. Regardless of time and ignoring genre, it is the approach of the individual which might bring about innovation. A slightly jarred view of a traditional form or a training in one tradition with the desire to decipher another; hardcore kids deciding to make pop music, a producer brought up on hip hop and then weened onto house.
Self-admittedly, Alex Israel slips neatly into that latter category. Although not overt in Gaz-13, Israel’s history of hip hop production suggests the route by which he has settled on an aesthetic entirely of his own; hip hop’s compulsion to explore new sounds and find new squeals, all framed by the house producer’s meticulous eye for arrangement: introduction and removal. Israel is, among other comrades, still exploring. An original settler who’s found his way North but won’t stop moving. Check out his soundcloud, there’s a lot more there and it’s all this good.
W.T. Records released Alex Israel’s album ‘Walking To Guntersville’ on 13th June 2011
