Well, we had a feeling this San Diego-based musician would start to branch off with neighborhood electronic music labels whose mandates run parallel to each other –it’s bound to happen. Having released his debut audio goods with Oakland’s n5MD imprint (Distal, MD and Fragile Constitution, CD3) and yet another recent CD-EP on Component Records, Spencer Lytle continually delivers percussive fragments of torn electricity where rhythmic pulses interact with skewed melodic hooks. It’s a formula that, after time, unleashes itself into a realm of instant notification –Portland simply sounds like Portland. It’s in these moments of recognition when you start to realize the lasting impression that digitally enhanced music has on the senses. So is the case with Uprox Detox.
Time gradually shifts, snaps and alters itself until nothing is left within the landscape. Layers of lonely ambiences drift into oblivion. Percussive bursts of energy casually unveil themselves –and it’s in the emotional uproar of mechanically inclined electronics where you’ll find solace –strangely enough. Uprox Detox offers an emotional backdrop of soothing atmospherics that topple above syncopated beat-work. Though early Aphex Twin and Gridlock associations could be generated after rotating a few of the pieces herein, it stands to reason that Portland still captures his own articulated groove from one plateau of complexities to the next; Essential electronic digestion –couldn’t you tell from the cover?
Uprox Detox is out now on Piehead Records.
