From a Failing Light is absorbing and totally transfixing, a message from the past with a touch of the present. The continuation of a legacy from a true legend.
A masterwork from the golden age of techno
Legacies are strange things. There’s the idea that they are something organic, the reward for exemplary efforts that transcend memory and time. Yet, there are some who, despite their merit and deserved celebration, just aren’t given the same credence as others. Steve Pickton falls into this category. A pioneer of the UK techno scene of the 90s, Pickton brought his own unique brand of spaced Detroit infused funk to labels like A.R.T., B12 and Peacefrog under a spread of monikers. His most recognizable pseudonym is Stasis, and it is under the name that De:tuned announce a welcome return.
From a Failing Light brings together a pair of tracks dug out from aged DAT tapes from 1992-1993. The opener, “Off All The Worlds,” is a perfect representation of Pickton’s sound. A sliding melody is veiled by a complex screen of percussion, a solid snare tethering the astral chords to speaker cones. Warbling notes shimmer against warming strings as the piece develops, a future-gazing track that thirty years still glows with an immensity of both idea and execution. Having shared the first Likemind 12” three decades ago with Stasis, Nuron appears once again on the same record; now remixing “Embrace.” This modern interpretation, created without the help of the original stems, is balanced and understated. Brittle beat patterns are the foundation from which strata of harmonies grow. Stasis’ original of “Embrace” occupies the flip. A drum barrage gives way to luxurious pads, arcing keys bend against the gravitational flow of these rhythms before sumptuous strings descend. A masterwork from the golden age of techno.
It’s easy to hark back to the past with electronic music, there were great times. Stasis was a central part of what made those times great. But, it cannot be overlooked by the quality of today. De:tuned has time and again delivered the amazing, and it has done so once more. From a Failing Light is absorbing and totally transfixing, a message from the past with a touch of the present. The continuation of a legacy from a true legend.
From a Failing Light is available on De:Tuned. [Bandcamp]
