REVIEW: Gearwhore, Drive (Astralwerks)
- Simon West
Leading electronic label Astralwerks has maintained consistent quality of late, and the debut album from Gearwhore, while not of the Chemical Brothers/Photek/Fluke caliber, is nonetheless a promising first release.
This one-man band is one Brian Natonski, who started out in Chicago's Trax Studio and earned his current moniker due to his relentless collection of equipment. He's apparently not using all of it, or you'd assume he would have come up with a little more variety in his guitar samples, but nevertheless has delivered a set of rocking, metallic dance, heavy on the guitars, analog synths and industrial samples along with the breakbeats and loops.
The excellent debut single "Passion" appears twice here, opening the album with the Harley Mix - a sampled motorbike and an insistent, driving beat, and closing with the dub version, a rather more minimal affair, mixing the rhythm with analog bleeps and loops. The nine tracks in-between are pretty strong too. "M'Lion" features a distorted vocal partially buried behind a fuzzbox guitar riff and and a brisk beat. The scratching, squeaking introduction of "Love" fades into a slow, atmospheric piano melody. "Ghost By Day" has a rather derivative but effective moaning vocal over a rapid beat. The straightforward beat of "Brain Fusion" has strands weaving in and out that sound variously like a John Carpenter film soundtrack and some of Depeche Mode's earlier instrumental b-sides.
Much of Drive shows excellent promise - the organic style sets it above many of its peers. Brian Clark Ebert's funky bass guitar is particularly effective on a number of tracks, some acoustic percussion is a weclome break from the usual electronic loops, and the mechanical samples lend the album an aggressive, industrial edge. A touch generic and somewhat repetitive in places, but Natonski will hopefully continue to develop his own style as he progresses.
As usual with Astralwerks, you can try before you buy - several tracks from the album and the "Passion" single are available in Real Audio format at the label's superb web site: http://www.astralwerks.com/gearwhore/default.html
