Review Summary: Red for furious beats and blissful synths
Coming from a disparate, yet rich from sounds and influences background,
Benn Jordan has created a signature style of creating music that's earned him an almost enviable place in the underground for the last decade. However, his extensive juxtaposition of charming piano and guitar lines together with all kinds of beats, bleeps and glitches, didn't feel that organic and fluid as in his latest releases.
Red Extensions of Me, his fifth full length release under the name The Flashbulb finds him gathering all those little pieces that would later serve as essential parts of an entirely fresh and powerful sound.
Being hectic in its most parts, but still remaining resilient in others,
Red Extensions of Me balances once again between Jordan's aggressive and atmospheric intentions. The dominant framework is one that follows the drum n bass aesthetic, accompanied by soothing passages of piano chords or lucid arpeggiated guitar lines. Though almost all of the songs include misty synth layers that wreath the mostly agitated beats, the album is clinging more to its sharper electronic side. The Aphex Twin and Squarepusher influences are clearly evident, although they are digested successfully through most of the records' parts. The typical delicate piano breaks are also present, delivering the tension (Eight Empty Beds), walking hand in hand with charming folkesque pieces like "If Trees Could Speak". "Lawn Wake's" three parts directly introduce the listener to the strange, yet carefully constructed insanity that's being breeding in The Flashbulb's mind: spastic rhythms, glitching sounds and insidious string sections blend together for a slightly confused, but still interesting experience.
Apart from combining such elements with the proper elegance in order to avoid inconsistency - a thing that he still needed to work on to during that time -, The Flashbulb has also incorporated other techniques in the album."Never Remember" arrives with a delicate ambiance that should have lasted longer. The electric/bass guitar MIDI - driven sequences that often appear, while adding some edge, usually sound old fashioned, integrating poorly with the atmosphere created in several tracks, like in " An Eternal Frost", where the mixture sounds rather unsuccessful. Similar effects can be heard in the acidic "Sunset Hamlin", which signals a twist to a more restful direction (Lucid Bass I and II) that finishes the album with samples of sleep therapy tapes, dreamy synth passages and classic drum n bass rhythms.
Parts of Benn Jordan's brilliance are scattered throughout
Red Extension of Me. Either buried under the drilling sounds and beats, or shining at the lavish atmospheres, they constitute the fragments of some future masterpieces such as the
Soundtrack to a Vacant Life or
Arboreal. Whereas not being as entertaining as its offsprings,
Red Extension of Me still stands as an album rich in ideas and innovative in their manifestation.
