- Dublin's [NAKEDLUNCH] seems like the boutique label that music lovers dream of running. Unburdened by entangling alliances and notions of family, few artists have returned to the imprint over the course of its six releases, save a house 12-inch from drum & bass outfit Instra:mental. Yet each outing showcases some of the most vital ideas that the producer has to offer. In other words? All killer, no filler. The imprint continues along that line with NL006, welcoming Detroit electro producer Sherard Ingram to the team for two cuts of melancholic bangers.
Melancholic because Ingram can't help but swathe his tunes in dreamy synths that waver inside and outside the beat. Bangers because, well, they still bang pretty hard. "Sentiment" may have a woman repeating the phrase "I love you" and a guitar line that almost seems more at home soundtracking the beginning of an Oasis tune, but she still races by at 160 BPM. "Sphere of Influence" is a bit slower, but not by much. Electro in the hands of amateurs can get tedious, beholden as any genre to ridiculous conventions. Stingray's sublime melding of hot and cold ensures that Sphere of Influence sounds like little you've heard recently, a reminder of what a bit of excellent label A&Ring can mean.
TracklistA Sphere Of Influence
B Sentiment