When he first emerged under his FaltyDL alias back in 2007, New York-based electronic producer Andrew Lustman was initially associated with the then burgeoning dubstep scene, but he’s spent the ensuing decade and six subsequent albums moving further away from those roots, his tracks branching out into techno, house and garage-influenced directions. Following his previous stints on Planet Mu and Ninja Tune, last year’s sixth album ‘Heaven Is For Quitters’ arrived on Lustman’s own Blueberry label, and as its title suggests this latest 12” EP offers up the first slice of a remix companion, with four different producers reworking tracks from that album.
For the most part the predominant mood here leans towards airy laidback house, both more broken and steppy, and also more minimalist and gliding. Irish producer The Cyclist kicks proceedings off with a remix of ‘D&C’ that casts the mostly ambient album track in a considerably more propulsive light as dry, aluminium-light broken house rhythms trace an offstep path against juddering ambient background tones and rippling electronics, the warm textures bleeding out into a swirling wash before more elastic electro-tinged bass grooves rise into focus, the fractured kicks and toms tightening up as the entire track glides off into a hypnotic wash of wavering tones.
If it’s easily one of the moments on this EP most explicitly aimed towards the dancefloor, elsewhere O’Flynn’s reworking of Lustman’s collaboration with Mike Paradinas ‘Frigid Air’, opts for a more understated ambient tech-house atmosphere reminiscent of the Kompakt label as refracted synth arpeggios bend and ebb against crisp snares and muted 4/4 kickdrums, dark bass tones adding a brooding undertone as bell-like percussion tones cycle against the suffling rhythms. On the flip, Palms Trax’s more upfront house reworking of ‘Neeloon’ drags things back towards the main room as twinkling arpeggios get scattered over a robust backbone of razor-sharp snares and 808 handclaps, the smeared out ambient synth pads that hang in the background introducing a distinctly early nineties feel brought out even more by the sampled yells and noodling analogue bass tones, but if it starts in euphoric territory, there’s a palpable sense of introspective comedown by the track’s end.
It provides a fitting segue into the warm nu-jazz grooves of Bugz In The Attic veteran Kaidi Tatham’s remix of ‘Drugs’, which sees Rosie Lowe’s multi-tracked soul vocals riding a flexing backbone of fluid broken-house rhythms as limber clavinet runs and piano keys build into a dizzying web of melodic textures, only to break down into a single stately piano motif as they disappear completely. As a first slice of remixes from FaltyDL’s preceding album, this sets a high standard to follow.
