Omar-S - Side Trak'x Vol. 4 (click to buy)
Cat No: AOS-410
Release date: 21 December 2015
Label: FXHE
A1. The Lost Albatross (Rosetta Hines Extended Mix)
B1. TGIOMDE
B2. XSE
Boomkat:
Heavy, rare-grooving Detroit business from the captain of his own industry. We’d wager you’ve seldom felt Omar-S like this!
Uptown, we’re blinded by the boogie, F.X.H.E.-style, with the slow, gritty but, soaring glyde of The Lost Albatross (Rosetta Hines Extended Mix) riding crack’n Linn drums and Yamaha keys accompanied by lush string solo from Ian Finkelstein.
Downtown, it gets even better with the petrol blue beatdown of TGIOMDE on some prime, Detroit Escalator Company or early Urban Tribe reel estate, beside the bestial soul vibes of X.S.E. - arguably the maddest, dopest, vibrator-sampling Omar-S pork joint we’ve ever heard.
Recommended!
Detroit's Omar-S used to take pride in making bare-bones rhythm tracks that required a little bit of work from DJs who wanted to unlock their secrets. "You got people like, 'Is that all the record do?' Yeah, bitch, that's all the record do," he boasted to the Infinite State Machine blog in 2007. "Your lazy ass needs to do some other shit with it." And when it comes to making hypnotic, minimalist assemblages out of just a few creaky moving parts, he's unparalleled. But in recent years, he's more often been turning his hand to melody.
Many of this year's singles—"I Wanna Know", "Ah Nother One", "Faahhuuuuuu"—have been real songs. "The Lost Albatross", the A-side to his new Side Trak'x Vol. 4 EP, is instrumental, but it follows a similar impulse. It's soaked in '80s synths and electro-funk chirp. A scuffed, simple drum pattern injects a hint of toughness to the softly swinging groove. Like all of Omar-S's music, the sonics are proudly unvarnished, but that's not to say they don't shine. Working with an array of buzzing, chiming synthesizers, he piles chords on top of chords, and every time you think you've got a handle on all the parts, another sparkling keyboard line pokes its head out. It's the clown-car approach to production: it may look modest at first, but open the door, and you'll be surprised at how many ideas come spilling out.
