- The latest and 45th instalment in the Kompakt Speicher series comes across like something of a crime thriller. Kompakt’s veteran hit man and co-founder Jürgen Paape opens the A-side with ‘Take this’, an attempted kidnapping. The sound is a direct extension to his last track on ‘Total 7’, going for static force rather than the sensuality of his classic ‘So Weit Wie Noch Nie’. The track opens intensely under a spotlight in a warehouse and threatens with a cold, square rhythm while the dirty, leathery synth riff lurches around menacingly looking for a fight. Yet in the end, there’s no real danger. The track’s modular construction is somewhat heavy handed as if scored off the ransom note, with its cut-out letters serving to interrupt the flow and any desire to move. Overall, the sounds are too brash and have too many edges to come together nicely. On the flip, however, Frenchman and rave angel Tom Pooks (a.k.a. Christophe Gimenez) arrives to take charge and cut the spoils with a genuine trance hit. ‘Amande Douce’ dispenses with brute strength and aims more for mood and tension, like being forced to drive at gunpoint across the desert. The cops are never far behind as the white-line pace and intensity slowly and steadily quickens to a stream of travel, tension and excitement. No curves, no edges. Only the combined roar of your blood and the engine, your foot, the pedal and the revolver steel heart-beat catching the sun. This is how it should be: captivating, hypnotic and thrilling. It’s a sinful promise from the relative newcomer to the Kompakt stable, and more a step up (as well as in line) from the B-side to his first Speicher 12” than the rest of his output. One filler and one killer.
TracklistA Jürgen Paape - Take This
B Tom Pooks - Amande Douce