Varg – Nordic Flora Pt.3: Gore-Tex City (Northern Electronics)

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Since Stockholm-based electronic producer Jonas Ronnberg introduced his Varg alias to the world back in 2013, he’s been a formidably prolific figure as well as a wilfully contradictory one, filling his social media presence with shots of him buying duty free bling at airports and chugging high priced champagne, whilst simultaneously championing uncompromising ‘underground’ electronic music through his own Northern Electronics label. As Ronnberg’s workrate has seemingly accelerated (this latest collection represents the fifth album he’s released during the last year), so have his levels of ambition. Indeed, this latest album ‘Nordic Flora Pt.3: Gore-Tex-City’ offers up the third chapter in a series that jumped over to the Posh Isolation label for its previous volume, and now returns to Northern Electronics for the third part of the trilogy.

A quick glance at the tracklisting also reveals that this is easily Ronnberg’s most guest-packed album to date, with collaborations with Swedish rapper Yung Lean, spoken word poet Chloe Wise, Coil associate Drew McDowall and Nine Inch Nails’ Alessandro Cortini featuring over its expansive 74 minutes. Given the forbidding associations conjured up by the collaborators here, I was surprised by how accessible this album actually was upon first listening. While distinct elements of techno remain in evidence here (perhaps most explicitly on the last two tracks), the main focus falls upon deep and emotive ambient landscapes that call to mind the melancholy chill of some Northern European city, layers of grey and rain obscuring the streets and buildings. Opening track ‘Champagne Ceremonies’ certainly belies its celebratory title as frigid synths trace a path through weary-sounding ambient pads and dubbed-out drum machine handclaps, the resulting funereal atmosphere calling to mind some of New Order’s early B-sides as elegiac melodic arrangements stretch into the distance.

In many senses, it’s emblematic of the deeply contemplative and immersive feel on display here, the pulsing ambient techno rhythms, muted kickdrums and Japanese train announcement samples of ‘Yamanote Line’ neatly sliding into place as dark power-line like buzzes and airy drones lurk in the background. By contrast, ‘Forever 21 / Valium’ sees Chloe Wise contributing an abstracted, seemingly non-linear flow of phrases and imagery, the fact that her verbal delivery is so reminiscent of Siri introducing an uncanny valley quality that calls to mind some narcissistic AI interrogating the listener with rapid-fire questions, the soft ambient drones that drift in the background adding an undertone of gentleness that feels hollow. Elsewhere, ‘Fonus’ sees Alessandro Cortini and Drew McDowall joining forces with Ronnberg as distant melodic pads and tentatively plucked notes bleed in through gauzy layers of flickering noise and treatments, the resulting effect calling to mind an oncoming snowstorm slowly covering everything in ice as droning horns echo in the background amidst what sounds like radio static.

It’s ‘Red Line II (127 Satra C)’ that really captures the contradictions at Varg’s heart though, as Yung Lean contributes a nihilistic and resigned sounding Autotuned rap that sees him imagining killing his landlord and throwing himself off a cliff, over Ronnberg’s deep, swooning backdrop of icy layered synths and skittering snares. Indeed, it almost feels like it works better than should on paper, Ronnberg’s deeply emotive electronics colliding with Yung Lean’s increasingly bereft imagery in a manner that certainly captures the detachment and desperate isolation that seems to increasingly lurk within Northern European urban environments, as the kickdrums slowly accelerate into a streamlined techno pulse. While it’s still early days, this could easily be one of 2017’s best techno albums.

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A dastardly man with too much music and too little time on his hands

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