Fifteen volumes in, Kompakt’s annual ‘Total’ compilation series has managed to maintain its characteristic high levels of quality, its tracklisting acting as an overview of the label’s highlights over the preceding year, as well as some moments that you might have missed. As you’d expect, this latest instalment ‘Total 15’ doesn’t see Kompakt messing with this proven approach, gathering together a sprawling tracklisting that captures the label’s more dancefloor house / techno-based side whilst also scattering in some more unexpected downtempo side explorations along the way. There’s certainly no faulting the impressive tracklisting here, with the likes of Audion, Superpitcher and Agoria making appearances alongside newer names like Dauwd and Vermont.
John Tejada’s ‘Two O One’ takes things out into glittering, vaguely proggy tech-house atmospheres as airy melodic tones waft against gritty drum machine snare breaks and lush ascending bass sequences, before Gui Boratto’s spectacular ’22’ sees him deftly balancing dark brooding shades and brighter twinkling melodic elements as a dense of web of crisp electro breakbeats shifts forward into fluid house rhythms and back again alongside rippling synth arpeggios. Dave DK’s ‘Smukke Lydde’ meanwhile offers up what was easily one of the biggest highlights of his recent ‘Val Maira’ album, the eerie grandeur of its fusion of lithe, jacking tech-house rhythms and swirling ghostly vocal drones offering up one of the best summations of Kompakt’s self-described ‘pop ambient’ aesthetic that I’ve heard yet.
As mentioned before though, it’s the occasional forays away from the dancefloor that offer up some of this compilation’s most interesting moments, with Blond:ish’s ‘Stolen Romance’ providing a vaguely chanson-tinged wander through slow languid percussion, phased guitar trails and wordless vocals, before The Black Frame’s ‘Sacrosanct’ takes things out into ebbing post trip-hop territory that recalls G-Stone’s smoky excursions more than anything else. If you’re a fan of Kompakt’s characteristically inspired ‘Total’ series, you’re unlikely to be disappointed with what’s in store on this latest impressive volume.
