Rasmus
If "Music Is Love" as Rasmus claims in the title of
his new single, then his journey in pursuit of that
music has been quite some romantic quest.
26 year old Rasmus grew up on an island in the
Baltic sea off the coast of Sweden, spending much of
his teenage years with his ear pressed to a radio,
endlessly surfing the airwaves for rich and strange,
dark and distant sounds with which to feed his
insatiable imagination.
In the meantime, he studied to be an astronaut, this
presumably being the only way he could realise all
those mad ideas and images that space and science
fiction had planted in his head.
Alas, too many late nights spent Djing in Stockholm
and too many days spent poring over boring old maths
formulae persuaded him to drop out of college and
devote himself to searching for space in his music.
An early demo found its way, via enthusiastic
friends, into the hands of Boishi Records in London,
who signed him on the strength of it. He packed up
and decamped to London, living for several months in
the back seat of his second hand car. Never mind the
comfort of avoiding starvation, Rasmus preferred to
spend all his money as ever, on records.
But he was investing in his future, and all those
years of late nights and obsessive listening bore
fruit on his 1998 debut album "Mass Hysteria".
Widely praised on release for its original and
intelligent brand of techno coupled with block
rocking grooves, what also struck you was the
diversity of the sounds weaved into this head
spinningly eclectic record. He once described his
sound on that first record as 'loud and groovy,
kinky and abnormal'. That's not even the half of it.
Musically, Rasmus was reaping everything he had sown
in his formative years. "Mass Hysteria" was a
culture sodden post-modern melting pot, full of
generically scattershot echoes of everything from
punk to country to themes tunes and TV dialogue. On
one track the lyric is simply a list of wild
animals. But you know it makes sense.
Unlike so many of his more snobbish techno peers,
Rasmus has never turned his nose up aT pop, and
never sneered at happy hardcore or big beat's
populism. His greatest talent is marrying that
refined connoisseur's ear for new sounds to an
impeccably infectious pop sensibility.
Nevertheless, being the kind of guy who would never
want to belong to a party that would have him as a
member, Rasmus soon found himself eager to distance
himself from the big beat and 'old skooi' tags
various people had sought to stick on that record.
Besides, he insists that many of the seemingly
retro-ish sounds on 'Mass Hysteria" were an
accident, the result of not being able to afford new
equipment!
Now he's finally updated his gear, the sampladelic
sound collages that characterised "Mass Hysteria"
have been streamlined into a more chilled,
impressionistic aesthetic. It makes for a less
chaotic listen, but an even more sublimely
head-swimming set of tunes.
With the new album, Rasmus reins back the hysteria a
little but also widens his horizons, making for more
elegantly tripped-out beats and soundscapes, to
quietly mesmerizing effect. These tunes gently but
effectively infect your brain until they've taken up
permanent residence.
Check out "There's a Smile On My Bed", characterised
by a trippy supernova melody, flitting fireflies of
synth pop melody, and an insidiously understated
drum machine beat. Or "Kissing Day", where the ghost
of a jazz funk groove echoes round a hip-hoppish
beat then mutates into a trippy brass fanfare. Then
there's the surreal ultraworld of "The Barmaid From
Brixton" that swims in and out of different melodies
to marvellously hypnotic effect. Meanwhile, the
upbeat harmonies, brass inflections and an
irresistibly funky elasticated bassiine. But that's
so much talk. This is one record you have to taste
for yourself to really understand. On the first
listen, you'll probably be intrigued and
intoxicated, but after two you'll be tripped and
entranced. And by the third you'll be hopelessly
addicted.
Music is love. So love this music.
Johnny Cigarettes.... NME