Search - Various Artists :: Audio Alchemy (Eperiments In Beat Reconstruction)

This smart compilation from San Francisco trip-hop and acid-jazz label Ubiquity features 13 "downtempo" instrumental tracks from a variety of "progressive" DJs and sample-based producers. Q-Burns Abstract Message weighs in with "Last Stand," a blend of New Age-approved synthesizer washes and a tubby hip-hop groove. T-Cisco's gritty "Gritos" works the jazz-funk end of the spectrum, with scratchy wah-wah guitar and Motown bass supporting sonic storm clouds overhead. DJ Wally and DJ Swingsett's "Hungry in the Abstrakt" feels like a fever dream during a hot New York summer; voices, sirens, and rhythms shift in and out of focus, carried on a wave of synthetic drums. Molasses's gothic trip-hop anthem "Madness" suggests a remake of The Exorcist with Ice Cube as the earnest priest. Otherwise, the disc is accessible but interesting, deep but well-behaved--the kind of trip-hop you'd introduce to your folks. Also features Bugs, Cut Chemist, Mumbles, and others. --James Rotondi