Expert knob twiddling minimal techno
Who He?
Cardiff-based Bobby James Pike has clearly tuned into the eternal magic of the oscillator and the drum machine by plugging them directly into his brain and communing with them in some alternative dimension or other. Pike sent a demo to minimalist electronic don Steve Bicknell, the man whose LOST nights in the early 1990s brought the likes of Richie Hawtin to the UK for the first time. You can see why Bicknell snapped him up for his 6dimensions label. “Steve’s sound and ethos were the source of early inspiration,” says Pike. “He has always been involved in a very distilled and pure idea of music that I relate to.”
Why Heartless?
Sometimes it’s difficult to put your finger on why one slab of ultra minimal techno is head and shoulders above another. But when you hear it, you know it. It’s in the soul of the human who is plugged into the machines. That’s what you can hear on the EP opener ‘Circuit Form [0.2]’ as it bounces through its 11 minutes, the delicious kick drum keeping order as the synths spin wildly like whirling dervishes. It even ends in a spectacular manner, falling apart and riding to a halt. This is a track destined for legendary status.
Tell Us More
The six-minute ‘Are You Even There Anymore’ is another mini-masterpiece, its grinding bass curling itself around the warmth of the 909 kick and giving birth to thousands of tiny bubbles of synthetic bleeps and crackling static. Spectacular stuff.
‘Impulse Model’ is released by 6dimensions
