Review Summary: The circumstances do not favor Mr. Zimmerman, and this is visible from his newest album.
Back in December 2015, Joel Zimmerman was very done with a lot of things deadmau5. It is understandable that an artist aspires to develop new sounds and styles. To clarify the meaning of this, we know a man who has been in a very static career, bound to 128 beats per minute and a very recognizable yet easy-to-replicate house music style. For him this hasn't been the best field to work with and it manifested in a series of events in social media, with him quoted saying: "meh. considering killing off the "deadmau5" bullsh** and just start something new. did it before, can do it again. f*** it. why not." Though deadmau5 still exists and house music is still Mr. Zimmerman's area, his aspiration to approach electronic music in other ways is more apparent in W:/2016ALBUM/ than in any of his older works.
Indeed, we do have some very unusual pieces here. Take for example 'Cat Thruster', completely leaving the 128bpm field, having a very Ghosts n' Stuff-vibe to it anyway, or 'Snowcone', to many familiar to IDM, appearing as a knockoff from Boards of Canada. 'Glish', while feeling incomplete, gives us a lot of breakbeat-like ideas. The closing track, 'Whelk Then', also providing a very unidentifiable experience to many listeners, closing us to a very eerie feeling.
Of course, we do receive the traditional ping pong-delay, 128 beats per minute, reverb-rich deadmau5 house on this album. 'Deus Ex Machina' is a very passionate piece, reminding me of what 'Take Care Of The Proper Paperwork' tried to reach back in 2012. 'Imaginary Friends' giving us a throwback to For Lack of a Better Name, 'Let Go' being a very stripped 11-minute piece with very minimal structure and '4ware' being in more common category when it comes to deadmau5 production.
We do indeed have pieces that stick for a time and then make way for the next. It is a consistent trend with deadmau5 that the songs are not necessarily built to any significant progression but rather indulge with ambience and the completion of the song itself. Therefore, there is extra room for masterful transitions between the songs and this, to my knowledge, has been a major part in past deadmau5 records. It was by Mr. Zimmerman's words too that the album felt unfinished and it isn't difficult to pinpoint the feeling of being "slapped together". For example, With 'Cat Thruster', we're in a very funky place, full of color (and cats) and from there we're taken to 'Deus Ex Machina', a very unsettling 'Cthulhu Sleeps'-like nightmare. These kinds of transitions are apparent and hinder the experience of W:/2016ALBUM/ in it's entirety.
It is very important for Mr. Zimmerman to proceed as he chooses when it comes to the deadmau5-project, no artist should hinder oneself in pressure. The new genre experiments have been taken well in the fanbase to my knowledge, which may allow deadmau5 to stand in the future as a style rather than as a genre. I'd really look into that.
But for now, we've been given an album that is in-between a possible transition, introducing us to old and new. Album production has suffered due to this and we've been given an experience that parts from us unexpectedly while on that road giving us some things to recall, though the road is bumpy. I do wish good luck to our struggling artist in the further attempts at mastering what he is looking forward to doing for his fans and presenting us what he sees in deadmau5 eight years after Random Album Title.
