Veröffentlicht
May 17, 2014
- Krankbrother certainly hasn't been alone in staging parties around old industrial spaces in London over the past few years; at times it feels like there's barely a crumbling corner of the city that hasn't had clubbers crammed into it at one point or another. But as they've wandered across cellars and rooftops, brothers Danny and Kieran Clancy and the guests they've had along the way (Andrew Weatherall, Henrik Schwarz and Heidi among others) have established a sound slightly more glamorous than the grubby surroundings in which it's played, the essence of which they've tried to capture on their first compilation, Recollective.
Priding themselves on good taste, Krankbrother could almost have been packaged as part of the same chic lifestyle as the restaurants they run. You might also draw parallels between their menus and their music. Their Bonnie Gull restaurant is essentially a traditional fish spot given a hipster twist, and Krankbrother's sonic diet also relies heavily on tried-and-tested house recipes. There might be the odd bit of techno or an old disco number, like Space's "Carry On, Turn Me On"—the equivalent of porcini cream, you might say—but it's not the place to go for boundary-pushing fusions or anything too exotic.
Of course, sometimes you just want what you know presented with class and professionalism, and in that sense the brothers do the job. They don't skimp on the portions either: Recollective presents over two hours of music on two CDs. The first, featuring tracks like the bumping Levon Vincent mix of Mike Dehnert's "Umlaut 2" and the taut electro of Click Box's "Sci-Fi Loop," has more of a basement feel, while the second seems more inspired by their gigs further afield in Croatia and Ibiza, with the louche disco of Locolossus' "Next To You" or Show B's slinky "Jammin." Both have great tunes aplenty—the gliding groove of Jay Shepheard's remix of Plain Pits, the low-slung psychedelic strut of The Ashpodells' "Late Flowering Lust" and E.S.P.'s classic "It's You" to name three—and both simmer along at the same midtempo pace. The mixing is smooth, competent and completely unsurprising. That's fine in a warm-up set, but after a while you're desperate to get there, and ultimately the mix struggles to capture the buzz of actually being at a Krankbrother party. Just as atmosphere is as important as the food to a good restaurant, so there's more to a memorable club than just the music—something you simply don't get in a takeaway.
TracklistCD1
01. Arto Mwambe - Hum ALong (Move D's Move Along Remix)
02. Ricardo Villalobos, Jay Haze - Fenlow (Haze 2011 Dub Remix)
03. MATRiXXMAN - Case Closed
04. Click Box - Sci.fi Loop (Danny Benedettini Remix)
05. LIT - Brown Dwarf (Hyena Stomp Red Giant Remix)
06. Krankbrother - Electric Lucifer
07. Mr. G - My Father's Farda (Mr. G's Soundboyz Dub)
08. Mike Dehnert - Umlaut 2 (Levon Vincent NY Basement Mix)
09. Krankbrother - Together
10. Rework - Werewolf (Magda Remix)
11. Chronic Sounds - Evelin's Basement (Environmental Mix)
12. Plain Pits - Requinto (Jay Shepheard Remix)
13. John Tejada - Anaphora
CD2
01. Locussolus - Next To You
02. B.W.H. - Stop
03. Cisco Cosco - If You Want Me
04. Le Corps Mince De Francoise - Gandhi (Andrew Weatherall Remix)
05. Show B - Jammin (Black Label Edit)
06. Headman - Be Loved (Daniel Avery's 'Divided Love' Remix)
07. The Asphodells - Late Flowering Lust (Phil Kieran Remix)
08. Hunee - Rare Silk
09. Arto Mwambe - Home Strainer
10. Jaime Read - Pleasure Principle
11. E.S.P. - It's You
12. Space - Carry On, Turn Me On