Rumpistol – Talk To You EP (Rump)

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Rumpsitol is the brainchild of Danish producer Jens Berents Christiansen, and is released on his own burgeoning label Rump. You’d be mistaken if you thought that all of these references to “rump” were about booty-shaking. While the music contained on the Talk To You EP would fit into a darker DJ set, you wouldn’t really be tempted to play it out at a “hands in the air” kind of party. Talk To You is Christiansen’s fourth outing as Rumpsitol, and he also produces work for theatre, television, film and games.

Having not heard any previous Rumpsitol releases, I learned that this latest EP was a departure in some ways by relying heavily on vocalisations. Perhaps in a similar vein to James Blake, who slowly metamorphasised from pure instrumentals to a more “traditional” song based approach, Talk To You is filled with vocal lines twisting and turning over the seething dark rhythms pulsating beneath. The vocals mainly consist of a single line, typically the title of the particular track, repeating over the duration of the song. Instead of being tedious, as they well might become in this instance, the vocals themselves have been treated in a similar way to the music tracks, detuned, processed, delayed, in other words heavily manipulated. The tracks themselves are synth based workouts, not dubstep (although “In This Song” has that filtered LFO bass line), not glitch, not dub. The genre listed on the track’s ID is “broken soul” which is probably appropriate, but not as soulful as James Blake’s latest release. Perhaps the heavy processing that masks the vocals also removes some more soulful elements that may have otherwise been retained. Perhaps not.

The music is very bleak, and it isn’t until you hit the remix of “Talk To You” (by label-mates System) that the bleakness completely disperses. Pulsing heavy bass and less mimimal percussion drive the song into the light. While the music on Talk To You isn’t necessarily oppressive, it is dark and quite dire. When Christiansen (one assumes that it is he, although the vocals sound more like a female cabaret singer) laments “we’re not gonna make it” midway through the track of the same name, you really get the feeling that we probably won’t make it. I don’t know what it is, but it’s just not going to happen. Strangely it is through the repetition of the vocal line that the despair seems to lift. What begins as desperation somehow transforms into something else. It’s not joy, not even happiness, but there is hope.

It could well be that Christiansen’s theatre and film work has informed his ability to shift emotions in the middle of a song. This is no mean feat. It is difficult enough for an artist to create a single emotion in music, let alone to be able to transform emotions mid-passage. Talk To You is being released as a four track 12″ with a download voucher for the remaining two tracks, including the remix. It is an interesting record, one that I have been happy to listen to. I think it would work best as a record to put on after coming home in the early hours, it has the power to shift in a similar way as dawn – darkness recedes, light comes in.

Jason Heller

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