Portland Carqynez CATMD117

Portland follows up his recent debut MiniDisc with this 7" of conflicting moods. The 4th instalment to our 7ransparen7 series finds Portland charting new musical territory. Side A finds him experimenting with wavering chilled out hip-hop. Side B reveals a mid tempo breakcore crusher. Contradiction never sounded so good... [ learn more about Portland]

electronic music world

n5MD is a label that releases all high-quality IDM-ish music, mainly in the more laidback regions of that "genre" as far as you can call such a wide spectrum of music a genre. Aside from (for me) favorites such as Proem, Spark and Tim Koch, Portland has now also released music there. I am reviewing here a 2-track release, the beautiful The Carqynes 7".

When I first saw it I immediately liked it. I hadn't even heard it. The packaging, though simple, is beautiful and effective. A normal plastic sleeve containing semi-transparent white paper, and a beautiful clear vinyl 7". The only two "solid" things are the label on the vinyl, and a sticker stating which release this is.

But then comes the music. Beautiful laidback idm. Each side contains one track and both tracks are great! Side A contains distal.efx, which is a laidback, very minimal downtempo beat overlaid with a nice bassline and a very beautiful lingering melodic sound.

Side B contains playing.again, a more uptempo tune which is less laidback, more tense. The rhythm is, at times, slightly harsh. Where distal.efx focussed more on minimalism, this track focusses on the more complicated rhythms, and is as a whole more "full", more solid. playing.again is also more appropriate for the dancefloor where distal.efx would fit more in a chillout room.

All in all, this is a very good 7". Both sides have their own charm, and are very good tracks. Both are nice to listen to, and though a bit short, playing.again could even be used on the dancefloor. A recommended release for those liking such labels as Warp Records or U-cover.