Eight focused tracks that while gradually penetrating your brain like a glacier sliding on rough terrain, manages to peel various layers of electronics with an emphasis on chilled basslines and subtle rhythmic flows.
It’s difficult these days to get excited about the prospect of a new release, let alone a 37-minute EP composed of eight tantalizing tracks. Chris Amell (label operator at High Grade Media) and multi-faceted Atlanta-based producer citizenGreen has just unleashed Ulterior Motives — it’s time to get excited. One may question Chris Amell’s ulterior motives on such a release, and rather than delve into semantics, it is quite evident that what’s on display is a very well produced EP that doesn’t hold back with the addition of a few vocals (almost unheard of in experimental electronics) balancing the stream of consciousness.
citizenGreen’s expansive audio field brings to mind the classic sound of imprints like Toytronic and Neo Ouija, however, Ulterior Motives is more than just a mere recollection or consolidation of the past, but rather a focused a layered musical entity of its own. Spiraling somewhere between dub infestation and delicate electrical tricks, the mood on this EP is upbeat and rather effective for an opener to 2011. Beats, bass and bent melodies trickle through unknown crevasses yet somehow the results can be summed as pure bliss.
“A Clever Ruse” (audio stream below) is a kaleidoscopic groove that is both fluid and distorted with just the right amount of casual digital maneuvering. “No Tomorrow,” a refined lyrical manifesto, twitches with raw rhythms and an emotional pulse while “Float3r” majestically rips open with an ambient undercurrent full of percussive beauty and microscopic tides. “Greenhouse Effect” can be best described as the perfect marriage of dub and downtempo while Tay0’s remix delivers similar melodies with deconstructed beats all reworked with an experimental twist. Saving the best for last, Ryan Noise remakes “A Clever Ruse” with his “Foiled The Ruse” remix and does so with an opening swell of beats and (female) moans that stretches the lines of innovative electronic-hip-hop and is a definite floor filler. Eight focused tracks that while gradually penetrating your brain like a glacier sliding on rough terrain, manages to peel various layers of electronics with an emphasis on chilled basslines and subtle rhythmic flows.
“Imagine if there was no tomorrow; no time left for your soul tomorrow; how many things did you check off your list? How much time before you cease to exist?”
Ulterior Motives is out now on Nophi. [Listen | Purchase]
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