by Jason Grimes

The forces behind the dark veils in which we hide watch us in silence as we scream. Primal wellsprings unprocessed by the conscious mind grow tumorous and torturing, snacking on synapses and gorging on grey matter. Patterns of thought ricochet out of control, producing rabid tracers that bounce helter-skelter in our skulls. We are full of stories irreproducible by voices, incommunicable through language. With howling ambition, the demons inside must be exorcised; medicinal science can not help. Where will the machinations meet with substance?

Minimal techno by rote, attempts to parlay this chaos into order. Through streams of repetition, minute changes take on significant meanings. The mathematics of structure is laid bare, and with precision manipulation ethereal meanings can be exposed. But, as is often the case with art, few such pieces of work are profound enough to speak on a deeper, more intuitive level. Enter then Christian Vogel, our dungeon master, hoping to light the dark inside.

At first glance you've heard it all before, the beats swirling in a crushing cacophony laying that rugged, robotic foundation. Add the variables: the crisp chisel of precision highs weaving a skein between the distant rumbles of looped effects, the standard sonic tricks dropped in as aural spice, random changes of theme attempting to tell their tonal tale through the minute shifting, falling, cascading and coalescing of the sound some of us love but others find boring, repetitive and banal. It's easy to preach to the choir, but what about the pagan souls? Will they eat this up? I believe the plates will be licked clean by those ravenous for adventurous, aural alchemy...

Dungeon Master is a recipe of techno wizardry which veers far from the normally charted course, blazing trails through a wickedly unique world, perfectly observed in a buffet of nine tracks and an exclusive live P.A.

What truly separates this release from the "cut and paste" efforts of lesser techno talents is the unbridled depth of sequencing Vogel presents here. Often, the range of chaotic patterning is akin to some of the finest IDM, but with that full fisted punch of ferocity techno brings to the table. For starters, "Macropanopticontinuum" sets the LP off with what at first appears to be a standard techno steamer. But turn the volume up full blast, and await the viral eardrum infection.

Samples briskly decay towards the first breakdown; then the scope of this release finally crawls from the shadows to reveal itself as the ravaged, mutant, bastard son of electronica it is. Eschewing simple, minimal formulas relying merely on exploiting musical qualities in space and time, layer upon layer of gutter-funked, dirty, digital nastiness dive-bombs into the unprotected cerebellum. At times, the crunching sounds overpower; other times they transmigrate effortless between jilts in direction—what seem to be completely random switches in structure are, on closer inspection, masterfully purposeful constructions.

In short, this is a phenomenal release packed with an almost limitless amount of innovation. From the tweaked experiments in cutting and timing of "Spank Bass" to the IDM foray of "The English Cut", the lines between genres of head fuck music are obliterated by Vogel, as he recreates techno into his own darkly sublime vision. A must have release.

Cristian Vogel - Dungeon Master
Tresor

CD 1:

1. Macropanopticontinuum
2. Pigeon Battle
3. Diggin Fo Da Earth Gamba
4. Tasty Mission
5. Spank Bass
6. The Backwards "S"
7. Matchless
8. The English Cut
9. Hot Gossip

CD 2:

1. Live PA 2001