Label: Separated Beats
Released: 2009

01. Hu Maan
02. Pankobabaunka
03. Bakalim
04. Weil Der Puls
05. Feuerbaum (Live)
06. Soma Naela (Live)
07.A Fiesta Siacha (Live)
07.B Untitled

Separated Beats is a new sublabel of German Klangwirkstoff Records. Klangwirkstoff's music is constantly based on "planet tones, cosmic octave" etc., whereas Separated Beats was created with a thought of "all other kinds of electronic music". I was very excited with that fact: the Klangwirkstoff sounds are unusual and unusual sounds I have expected of Separated Beats. Sounds range doesn't matter - the main thing is that we deal with the same authors; I thought. I didn't think about its style, what kind it could be, just simply decided to give myself to it, as it can be said beautifully, I wanted to go through the looking glass. Klangwirkstoff is the highest musical league, so it would be weird (naive, stupid) expecting a lower one of Separated Beats. No matter what the style could be, I trusted in their choice. And I was disappointed. ...Let's rewind this review to its real beginning.

The first Separated Beats release is "Hu" album of a German group called Orange, which line-up includes Stefan Woehrle, Lukas Kuczera, Niko Lai, Rainer von Vielen, Wolfgang Wahl and Marcus Wichmann. The project is known for live performances, never had any connections with the psyscene, and "Hu" is their another album (they debuted in 1999 with "Curry"). The band's member - Rainer von Vielen, was previously engaged in Klangwirkstoff's "Active Agent Of Sound" compilation, where he closed both discs with his great skill - a throat singing. And yes, that was the only one thing a person like me could, in some degree, expect of Orange. So in a way yet the eastern direction, not the western one, could have been already written in the common denominator of Klangwirkstoff and Separated Beats. Going on directly to the Orange music, then, indeed, the previous thought will be supported by a suitable fact: "Hu" is an ethno/tribal/world trance. We have a trance base of arrangement, tribal percussion (wide range), and a vocal at the pedestal. The two key figures of the Orange team, that in the most characteristic way emphasize their sounds, are Wichmann - thanks to a didgeridoo - and von Vielen - because of the vocal. "Hu" has seven tracks and lasts 53 minutes; the last track has also a hidden composition almost three minutes after the end of the base one. The album was released in a digipack with two wings.

The group's aim isn't unique, but always intriguing: Orange's aim is to do a fusion of the past and the future, that is a tribal percussion and appropriately created mystic (mystical touch) to it, as well as contemporary electronic elements, passably adapted to the mentioned live performances. Unfortunately, already the first listening to the album gave me very bad feelings about their music. Two problems exists to which there is a need to take a stance on. The first is a vocal. We deal here with a throat singing, which is not the problem - the problem is a regular vocal, that very strongly existss here as well, in addition: in German language only. Vocal in a language we don't understand not always must means a problem, however, this situation exists when that vocal is uncompromising and lively, when it's so integral part of the music, that we simply want to know what's behind it. We can't be indifferent to that type of vocal, since its overtone chokes us with its monotony; in "Bakalim" and "Weil Der Puls", to give the example, its intense is hip-hop-like at times. I asked the label/group about the lyrics translation into English (the digipack has no lyrics), but I didn't got any translations... All right, but the vocal of the type can be no problem for us, after all, we can listen to as if in the childhood, that is treating it as a melody of words... Anyway, that vocal, and quite fast, becomes just a small problem of the two and which are a kind of wall that blocks your way to get to the heart of the Orange matter, because what limits in a much more bigger way the project's music universality, is a crummy quality of its arrangement's electronic part.

The trance style formula is a base for the rhythm of the whole tribal percussion and vocal in almost all album's compositions. But from the entire range offered by Orange, only a bass in "Pankobabaunka" effectively highlight that style. Effectively - that is programming something more original. In other tracks the trance base is bad: schematic, not vigour; it simply is and that's all. It is as good, as it can be in the situation when played "live". This is not the Hallucinogen's psychedelic trance, where every sound changes your perceiving. The most blatant example for that is in "Soma Naela": a bit acid melody is unmelodious at all, and in addition, you can have such a bitter impression, it is falsing, and by the way it lasts few minutes without any interesting change. Also, I don't understand why they putted a background's acid motive, a rotten one for me, in the main phases of "Fiesta Siacha". That destroyed its organic harmony.

That were two worst things related to Orange's "Hu". These are inseparable from they will to play live. There is nothing you can do - the home loud speakers wail. Or rather: did wail. After all, we finally came in that all, to a positive thing: fine, this doesn't work on the laws of the psychedelic trance, and as trance as a feeling, at all, but works on the laws of that tribal trance - as an artificial style of music, and pleasures. It works basing on uncomplicated and unadvanced method for a mental ecstasy, but that's a method after all. The first "Hu Maan" with a fresh introduces its harmoniously subdued tribal multicolours and rhythm take you to soft dance. The second "Pankobabaunka" is especially the jumpy bass, intense vocal and an afternoon whistle. The third "Bakalim" has a more sad style, pop-like, is a kind of tribal ballad (once again: can't say what's in the words, I take the impression from the all sounds, "only"), though you also can see in it a little dry (here) notes of a beloved TB-303 synthesizer or its emulation. The fourth "Weil Der Puls" is a hymn to the sun at sunrise and the action's tempo lowering. The fifth "Feuerbaum (Live)" is a faster tempo and addition of a catchy melody. The sixth "Soma Naela (Live)" has foppishly sparks that come out thanks to the 303 world commitment, a dark pad, vocal, and ten minutes of steady tempo, and steady scenario as well. The seventh "Fiesta Siacha (Live)" is a bigger pressure onto percussive teamwork and much more happy, carnival atmosphere, while the bonus composition is a few minutes spent in a studio doing a little bit experimental fun.

And so this is how it... nicely and weirdly look like. The best thing in Orange and "Hu" is a harmony of the percussions, the worst elements are the electronic ones. At the beginning, "Hu" is boring, predictable and primitive, but after a few listenings you appreciate its curiosity. It can be stated, this is a commercial side of the eastern world fusion into the modern times. I will, I am agree with that. That's why I am disappointed. The Klangwirkstoff's music is full of fights for the deep sound. I was expecting some experiments in Separated Beats, while we get something that is no experiment, something that is... incomprehensible. Even if I like "Hu" sound, this sound is too common in the context of what Klangwirkstoff proposes. It doesn't match. The difference is gigantic.