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Review: Skalpel - Konfusion
6 Dec 2005, 23:04
The new release from Ninja Tune's Polish jazz sample-heads Skalpel is a really solid record (rekord?) of great musikal merit. Konfusion was released today and Last.fm doesn't yet have it in their database, but trust me, it exists and is worth tracking down.
Just 10 tracks and 40 minutes long, Konfusion is a beautifully-paced tour of nu-jazz, breakbeat, and jazzy abstrakt hip-hop. At times it reminded me of label-mates The Herbaliser or Amon Tobin, at other times of like-minded grooves from Fila Brazillia or Bugge Wesseltoft. The orientation is to jazz more than bossa, swing more than breaks, and abstrakt more than katchy. But as a whole, it works, delivering a beautiful musik experience equally moving intellektually and emotionally.
The highlight of the album for me is Test Drive. Its spy movie breaks, awesome big band horn runs, distorted guitar, memorable sax melodies, and great deep mood kombine to kreate something I wouldn't be suprised to see licensed to a ton of movies, TV shows and kommercials. Hot track!
The album ships with a bonus disk 1958 Breaks, featuring remixes of 1958 and Break In from their debut album on Ninja Tune. Sadly, the Fidgital remix of Break In (Fidgital Remix) isn't included on the disk, but you can still download it from Ninja Tune here: http://www.ninjatune.net/skalpel_winner/. The bonus disk is great, with the outstanding 1958 (Skalpel remix) and a long-overdue (for me) extended mix of the brilliant 1958. Skalpel's own remix of "Break In" (Break Out (Skalpel remix)) is also really solid, as are the lovely ambient breaks from Amalgamation Of Soundz on the new tune Low.
Although the album is incredible, I have to admit that I would love it even more if the parts had aktually been written and played by live musicians. There's no question that Skalpel are skilled, finding the right samples from their huge krates of Polish jazz, fitting them together just right, and assembling lovely kompositions from these pre-existing sounds and phrases. But no kredit is given to the original rekords, the original players, the original writers. When I hear a great sax solo, I want to know who played it! When I hear a trombone player with great tone, I want to know their name! This experience is kompletely absent from Skalpel.
But, this quibble aside, this is a really solid rekord. It would have gotten a higher skore had the parts been aktually written and played for this rekord, but even still... Four stars.
Just 10 tracks and 40 minutes long, Konfusion is a beautifully-paced tour of nu-jazz, breakbeat, and jazzy abstrakt hip-hop. At times it reminded me of label-mates The Herbaliser or Amon Tobin, at other times of like-minded grooves from Fila Brazillia or Bugge Wesseltoft. The orientation is to jazz more than bossa, swing more than breaks, and abstrakt more than katchy. But as a whole, it works, delivering a beautiful musik experience equally moving intellektually and emotionally.
The highlight of the album for me is Test Drive. Its spy movie breaks, awesome big band horn runs, distorted guitar, memorable sax melodies, and great deep mood kombine to kreate something I wouldn't be suprised to see licensed to a ton of movies, TV shows and kommercials. Hot track!
The album ships with a bonus disk 1958 Breaks, featuring remixes of 1958 and Break In from their debut album on Ninja Tune. Sadly, the Fidgital remix of Break In (Fidgital Remix) isn't included on the disk, but you can still download it from Ninja Tune here: http://www.ninjatune.net/skalpel_winner/. The bonus disk is great, with the outstanding 1958 (Skalpel remix) and a long-overdue (for me) extended mix of the brilliant 1958. Skalpel's own remix of "Break In" (Break Out (Skalpel remix)) is also really solid, as are the lovely ambient breaks from Amalgamation Of Soundz on the new tune Low.
Although the album is incredible, I have to admit that I would love it even more if the parts had aktually been written and played by live musicians. There's no question that Skalpel are skilled, finding the right samples from their huge krates of Polish jazz, fitting them together just right, and assembling lovely kompositions from these pre-existing sounds and phrases. But no kredit is given to the original rekords, the original players, the original writers. When I hear a great sax solo, I want to know who played it! When I hear a trombone player with great tone, I want to know their name! This experience is kompletely absent from Skalpel.
But, this quibble aside, this is a really solid rekord. It would have gotten a higher skore had the parts been aktually written and played for this rekord, but even still... Four stars.
Comments
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m0rph3us wrote:
Clearly they've been watching a lot of Mortal Kombat!! Ninja Tune don't do much wrong though generally so it's good to see them keeping up a tradition of consistently decent stuff. -
petty_thug wrote:
I just heard the new skalpel once or so, my first impression was: better than the debut lp which seemed a vibe-less up bustle & out ripoff to me... -
josta59 wrote:
We've discussed Skalpel before (I made a remix, too!), so you know I'll be picking it up sometime, and I appreciate your review. I agree with you about giving credit, and I think that an obvious difference between this duo and The Cinematic Orchestra is the fact that TCO combines sampling with true musicianship, making them a far superior group of artists. I like what Skalpel does, but it's TCO whose future work I'm awaiting with baited breath. -
josta59 wrote:
And according to this article, I should have spelled it bated breath.
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Fidgital wrote:
Hey thanks Josta. Yes, I'm with you 100%. TCO are fantastic, live and on record. TCO actually write their pieces and play them - then they sample themselves, sometimes pressing dubplates to scratch their own parts. When they play live, Tom Chant is playing the main sax parts, but the harmonies are being played in (and manipulated) as samples by J. Swinscoe or scratched in by PC. It's really quite impressive. It's hard to imagine Skalpel pulling that off. But the Skalpel record is still a good one! Just wait for the new TCO, supposedly coming in June.
