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Skin Contact
Pleasure, Pain, and Distraction
Posted: Friday, March 21, 2008
By: Dillon Carlyon
By: Dillon Carlyon
An expertly engineered mixture of dark techno and drum & bass.
The first full length from Kevin Breidenbach's main project, Skin Contact, is impressive, and reveals the time that this solo artist has spent building his engineering skills and his unique sound. Everything comes to fruition for Skin Contact in Pleasure, Pain, and Distraction, the appropriately ambitious title of this new release. Trance and techno fans will be happy with the creative hooks and well developed moods, while drum & bass fans should find the hard and relentless beats to their liking. Kevin's sound has definitely shifted away from a fairly typical techno formula to an edgier jungle influence that is less easy to put into a box than the previous material. The drum & bass element is still a strong presence in the new album, but it is more creatively generated and maintained than many similar projects currently putting out new material. A lot of unexpected things happen during this album; there are a number of tricky songs here that flip upside down when least expected, revealing a refreshing second face, a multidimensionality that's becoming harder and harder to come across.
"Fall" is structurally sound, beginning with a dull, metallic throb and adding in an unpredictable beat, high swells and chirps, and scratchy synth lines. "Gemini" has an almost inquisitive feel to it, beginning with an unsure footing and gradually moving up into a stratosphere of quickly moving synths. "Clear" changes things up nicely, first with a heavy, slow beat, some distrorted vocal textures, then moving into a double-time beat, becoming more energetic and chaotic. Some songs, especially "Scant" and "Snakebite," are very minimal and offer well timed breathing spaces in the track list. Most of the album runs somewhere between minimal electro and breakbeat, trading notes between these two influences. There is a well developed range of moods from start to finish that makes the album a satisfying listen from beginning to end.
Pleasure, Pain and Distraction refuses to be ignored and manages to deliver some intriguing highlights. It will appeal to fans of many electronic genres, but will also be appreciated by those with a taste for the experimental who disdain the imaginary restrictions of genre borderlines.
"Fall" is structurally sound, beginning with a dull, metallic throb and adding in an unpredictable beat, high swells and chirps, and scratchy synth lines. "Gemini" has an almost inquisitive feel to it, beginning with an unsure footing and gradually moving up into a stratosphere of quickly moving synths. "Clear" changes things up nicely, first with a heavy, slow beat, some distrorted vocal textures, then moving into a double-time beat, becoming more energetic and chaotic. Some songs, especially "Scant" and "Snakebite," are very minimal and offer well timed breathing spaces in the track list. Most of the album runs somewhere between minimal electro and breakbeat, trading notes between these two influences. There is a well developed range of moods from start to finish that makes the album a satisfying listen from beginning to end.
Pleasure, Pain and Distraction refuses to be ignored and manages to deliver some intriguing highlights. It will appeal to fans of many electronic genres, but will also be appreciated by those with a taste for the experimental who disdain the imaginary restrictions of genre borderlines.
