Boomkat's verdict:
If you're able to produce the kind of bass-drops and low-end charges that inhabit much of this excellent debut album from Ralph Cumbers' Bass Clef project, you'll find yourself in very good company at the tail-end of 2006, a year that's ushered in Low-End theorists with the kind of feverish excitement not seen since the heady days of 1970's towering dub. Bass Clef don't quite straddle the tried and tested Dubstep templates that have become de rigueur for the scene as the months have passed, instead opting for a more schizophrenic approach that takes-in Cumbers' evidently well-worn collection of Idm, Dub and Jungle records, mashed up and re-processed with a heavy analogue underlay that gives each of the 13 tracks here much of their charm and untold heaviness. Not entirely unlike the Werk label's excellent Actress, Bass Clef don't discriminate against any given styles, pairing off Cumbers' Bristol roots against his current surroundings in Hackney - a sort of geographic trawl through bass culture that's incredibly modern yet well-grounded in over 30 years of beat science. "A Smile Is A Curve..." is precisely the kind of album the scene needs if it's to circumvent the faint whiff of fatigue starting to seep out of its pores. Like Boxcutter's "Oneiric" from early on this year it manages to be a jack of many trades and master of pretty much all of them - the proverbial having your cake and eating it, urban styles. Excellent.
If you're able to produce the kind of bass-drops and low-end charges that inhabit much of this excellent debut album from Ralph Cumbers' Bass Clef project, you'll find yourself in very good company at the tail-end of 2006, a year that's ushered in Low-End theorists with the kind of feverish excitement not seen since the heady days of 1970's towering dub. Bass Clef don't quite straddle the tried and tested Dubstep templates that have become de rigueur for the scene as the months have passed, instead opting for a more schizophrenic approach that takes-in Cumbers' evidently well-worn collection of Idm, Dub and Jungle records, mashed up and re-processed with a heavy analogue underlay that gives each of the 13 tracks here much of their charm and untold heaviness. Not entirely unlike the Werk label's excellent Actress, Bass Clef don't discriminate against any given styles, pairing off Cumbers' Bristol roots against his current surroundings in Hackney - a sort of geographic trawl through bass culture that's incredibly modern yet well-grounded in over 30 years of beat science. "A Smile Is A Curve..." is precisely the kind of album the scene needs if it's to circumvent the faint whiff of fatigue starting to seep out of its pores. Like Boxcutter's "Oneiric" from early on this year it manages to be a jack of many trades and master of pretty much all of them - the proverbial having your cake and eating it, urban styles. Excellent.