Novel 23 is Roman Belousov, and he beams his version of electronic music into the ether straight from Moscow, Russia. Novel 23 has crafted a soundtrack where one can finally dance about architecture. Architectural Effects is a wonderment of melody, an embarrassment of riches in today’s IDM scene. An album like this will be criminally under-exposed, and that is quite a shame. Antecedents to Novel 23’s sound would include the normal laundry list, Depeche Mode, Gary Numan, the inevitable Kraftwerk, etc. But Novel 23 does not have the retro-sound of the time of those artists, he sounds precisely out of time, because these songs have nothing to date them with. Classic melodies and tasty beats will always stand the test of time.
“Lucarne,” falling in the middle of the album, is a short piece, with a sad trumpet-synth sounding against a shimmering backdrop of echoing keyboards, like a velvet curtain blowing in the wind. The piece would seem too short, at under ninety seconds, until one realizes that less really is more, and that repeating the track only makes it more and more emotional.
Things shift gears a little with “Porticus of Grotta” (video included). Gorgeous keyboards amid clattering beats abound. There are no highlights on the album, for each track is an exercise in melodic and emotional development. In execution, Novel 23 hits the high water mark for contemporary electronic music.
Architectural Effects is OUT NOW on Bip-Hop.
