Some more spacey Krautronic explorations from Golden Cloud Tapes, this cassette features the synth work of Mr. Dave Doyen, who’s one of the three weirdos you’ll hear yammering about the latest fringe tapes on Tabs Out’s famed podcast. Nice to hear some tunes from any one of these guys (Vales is another associated project), but especially nice that these particular tunes are so… well, just plain nice. Smooth, sweet tones on Side A, a plethora of them stacking themselves up uniformly while at the same time bleeding down into one another, a melting pot of beautiful melody that results in a wide, expansive field of audio. There’s no friction here, like riding a million mile an hour treadmill through outer space, and just as scenic a voyage as that sounds like it should be. Side B breaks things up a bit melodically to offer more repetitive patterns that lay the ground work for electro-zap noodling. The second number on this half scrolls into some deeply hypnotic and troubling zones, psychedelic not exactly in a “bad” way, but in a “I don’t fucking trust whatever drug I just took” way. Circuit boards stutter and sputter on the periphery as some slinky lines slither and weave gingerly around one another, a cosmic dance for the ages. Excellent mind-warpage at work here, Doyen hits on a lot of different moods while maintaining a fairly uniform voice. It’s a little curious that things wind down with “Capsule,” one of the creepier numbers, since the tape has so many other lovely moments that might round things out a little cleaner. Still, one of the best in exclusively modular synth works that I’ve come across in recent months.
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