Where do I begin to tell you how thrilled I am to be writing this?
Let’s start here:
Ellen Allien’s SOOL sucked. It was minimal techno made for people who came so late to the party they’d feast on crumbs and scraps, a self-indulgent snoozefest that was painful to listen to made only worse upon realization that AGF had a hand in making the sonic dentist office wallpaper that was the entirety of the album.
And it killed me, wrecked me, to have to feel that, because Allien is the person who brought me to the peak of tech again and again, constantly salvaging my beloved electronic dance music when I’d turned my back on whatever the flavor of the moment was (stupid electro backwash, masturbatory and bland minimal bullshit). It was almost as though Allien knew she’d made a misstep-post SOOL, she retreated into DJ gigs and took a firmer hand with her BPC label, releasing two of the years BEST albums-the Apparat and Modeselektor team-up Moderat and Telefon Tel Aviv’s tragedy-tinged Immolate Yourself.
So quiet was she that I don’t think any of us saw this coming:
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A new 12″, “Lover”, with two new tracks. The a-side of which, “Lover”, is a jaw-dropping, pretty-fierce return to form (yeah I said it), the sort of thing Radio 1 DJs salivate over to open sets with, a track that immediately slams itself down on the table and says “ok, your move”.
It’s no small coincidence, also, that it kinda conjures stuff like Technotronic before pitch-shifting and ping-ponging its way into a steady, pulsing groove. I want to experience the bass a little heavier, but that’s undoubtedly my speakers and not Ellen’s fault.
Welcome back, Ellen. We missed you.
IT DID NOT SUCK, DAMMIT
No, it really did suck. This really is better though.