Bola – Shapes (Skam/Inertia)

Darrell Fitton’s earliest work appeared on Warp’s venerable Artifical Intelligence II compilation from 1994, and Shapes was recalls this era in electronic listening music. Originally released anonymously as a ridiculously limited edition vinyl triple pack in 2000 after his highly regarded album Soup on Skam, the tracks on Shapes date back to 1996. Now on CD, with three bonus tracks, and with a proper release for the first time, Shapes is like stepping into a time machine – back to a sound world that pre-dates the mass popularisation of glitch and the countless difficult algorithmic music that dominated electronic music at the end of the 90s. Influenced instead by the futuristic visions of Detroit techno and the space-age synthesiser music of the 70s, Shapes is rich with astral pulses, warm string pads, and bustling electro rhythms. Fonk (Flower), the opener, could almost be mistaken for a track on Artifical Intelligence II, whilst the dystopian synths on Zephyr (Pentagon) recall those radiant twin sun sunrises over an abandoned alien city you find on garish 70s science fiction bookcovers. Cobalt (Scope), one of the bonus tracks has a similar atmosphere, punctuated by laser bursts and with a skittering beetle rhythm that breaks down into a lovely floating melodic synth. Shapes is a timely reminder of the quaint futuristic impulses of post-Detroit electronic listening music, and in comparison the tired predictability that the more recent post-glitch and post-Boards of Canada ‘IDM’ has sunken into. Recommended.