Founded by a collective of established local artists including electronic producers Cacheflowe (aka Justin Gitlin), Scaffolding and Wayne Winters, as well as designer Snowblinded and VJ Movax, the Denver, Colorado-based Plastic Sound Supply label describes itself as being focused on releasing “cutting-edge, genre-defying experimental music, video and design.’ This inaugural compilation release from PSS “The Reprogramming Project’s acts as a collaborative remix project between label founders Cacheflowe, Scaffolding and Wayne Winters, and sees each artist respectively contributing four tracks, which are then also reinterpreted by the two others, resulting in a total of twelve different tracks here. Listeners previously familiar with Cacheflowe’ excellent 2005 debut album “Automate Everything’ on Nobot Media will already have some idea of what to expect here stylistically, and indeed Cacheflowe’ opening “A Dreary Flight Over The Datascape’ beautifully takes up from where that aforementioned release left off, with delicate snare trails and tentative, elastic synths giving way to the sort of meticulously contorted, DSP-tricked out downbeat hiphop you might expect from the likes of Funkstorung or Prefuse 73, complete with distorted digi-MC interjections.
Wayne Winters meanwhile opts for some slightly more foreboding textures on “Precious Moments’, sending ominous bass swells, bleeps and electronic twitches shuffling beneath a spacious backdrop of sparse downbeat rhythms in a moment that calls to mind a considerably more minimalist slant on Flying Lotus, before Scaffolding’ “Rebuild’ sees Sarah Marcogliese’ chanteuse vocals inject a more palpably “human’ edge, as her richly-reverbed tones glide out amidst a spectral backdrop of rattling, glitchy textures and forlorn-sounding synthesised bass pads – indeed, it’s this very source material that later on becomes reworked into a beautifully subtle slice of off-centre minimal techno / electro, courtesy of Wayne Winters’ forward-thinking, and fairly radical re-take. Elsewhere, Cacheflowe reshapes Wayne Winters’ “Precious Moments’ into a glitchy and bass heavy digi-hop excursion that drops some spinechilling dubstep-esque bass flanges in amongst the crawling beats that add an effective counterpoint to the lounge / RNB-tinged melodics on top, before Scaffolding offers up a burbling, click-heavy remix of Wayne Winters’ “Rebuild’ that calls to mind Pole or Deadbeat’s rippling, dubbed-out excursions as it sends subtly pulsing bass textures sliding beneath pin-prick kickdrums and muted snares. An inspired and consistently genre boundary-pushing collection that’s sure to appear to fans of IDM / glitch-tinged hiphop along the lines of Prefuse 73, Funkstorung and Telefon Tel Aviv, “The Reprogramming Project’s suggests more good things ahead for Plastic Sound Supply. It’s well worth seeking out Movax’ excellent sound-synched video for Cacheflowe’ remix of Scaffolding’ “Rebuild’ as well.
