Funk D'Void & Phil Kieran "White Light / Black As You Like"

Funk D´Void is best known for his string filled ‘Diabla´, the 2001 ending track of Danny Howells and others with its big bassline and overwhelming emotion. Phil Kieran is a still relative unknown student of straight techno from the Northern Ireland capital of Belfast. Together they are on Soma records for their AA release, featuring ´White Light´ and ´Black As You Like´.

´White Light´ shows a little bit of both the cooks in the kitchen. The pure tech house beat influenced by the minimal Kieran while the strings and melody are inklings of one of Soma´s founding artists in Lars Sandberg. Its build is slow but it uses good key shifts to move laterally through phrases.

´Black As You Like´ is a clinic in techno. Its minimal machinery could be by the Plastikman himself. A profusion of FX, glitch, and systematic percussion are at the heart of this sleeping giant. But it never really wakes up for me. It contains some elements of interest, including a blip that mimics one in the fun Zinger Meats Spry track ´Story of the Heaviest Bassline Ever´ and a snail paced vocal clip cut beyond intelligibility.

´White Light´ has some great potential and ´Black As You Like´ could be a real find if looking for some good minimal. But if you trend to lots of movement, this release might not be the borderline techno you crave.