Dusted Reviews
Artist: Lowfish Album: 1,000 Corrections Per Second Label: Suction Review date: Apr. 6, 2004 |
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It’s easy to mistake Lowfish’s 1, 000 Corrections Per Second as part of the whole electro-clash revival movement, but Gregory de Rocher has been making this kind of music well before the recent craze. Lowfish and Solvent (Jason Amm) established themselves in the mid-’90s when they started Suction Records and released some of the best melodic synthesizer music around. One cannot help but marvel at the array of sounds and textures de Rocher is able to coax out of his instrument; every squelch, beep, bass rumble, hum and percussive thump is rich and varied. The man works with an impressive sound palette.
Still, many of the songs on 1, 000 Corrections Per Second share electro-clash’s propensity for an age gone by. “Fric Frac” resembles the music of early Gary Neuman, not only in melody but in the particular keyboard sounds employed. “Air of Supremacy” and its galloping synth notes are strongly suggestive of the music of Erasure.
What distinguishes the music of Lowfish from dated influences like Depeche Mode, the Human League and Gary Neuman is that the latter included organic elements like human vocals or guitars, while the de Rocher makes pure electronic compositions from keyboards and computers. Another major distinction is de Rocher’s more complex melodic arrangements – where techno artists would be satisfied with sonic textural explorations or loops, melody is the grail for de Rocher, with his alien electronics only used to accentuate the hook. Like his counterpart Solvent, Lowfish has such a well-developed sense of melody that if these songs were replaced with something more organic, the tunes would likely hold up fine.
Thus, 1, 000 Corrections… is one of the brighter spots in the grey region between synth-pop and techno. The one long-standing criticism of Suction Records is the lack of vocals. It’s too bad the label can not find their equivalent of David Gahan or Andy Bell, who could theoretically make these fine songs even finer.
By I Khider
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