THRIFTWORKS – Fadest
aaamusic | On 20, Jan 2015
For a long time, I have personally lauded the exploration of music and admired those who find themselves straying past the edge of what we already know. In this context, I think electronic music is something of a final frontier…
…While it is by no means a new thing, there are still many stones left unturned. One specific space of interest exists where for years, hip hop and electronic music have been ferociously colliding like tectonic plates. The crust of these genres has since been thrusted up into a remarkably dense mass that towers over the rudimentary approaches sitting at the base of it’s precipices on either side. While it has never surpassed ‘pure’ electronic music or hip hop in popularity, this fused mountain plays host to a beautiful and inspired world of exploration.
To be more specific, I’m referring to a current of beat making that has become so much more than just making beats. The explorers seek to be as intriguing and ambitious as possible resulting in all kinds of expression. These seekers of the new land involve a range of minds from the likes of Lapalux to Shlohmo, Bambooman to Ta-Ku to Gaslamp Killer and even Flying Lotus himself; it’s an extensive and brave new world with artisans championing every node along a spectrum starting at crate digging and ending with sublime production using DAWs (with synthesisers probably sitting in the middle). In a brilliant trilogy named in order, Fade, Fader and Fadest, Thriftworks confidently shows he has the credentials to join this expedition.
Since 2010, Jake Atlas (Aka Thriftworks) has been releasing music on his bandcamp and has been invoking a charming clutter of noise out of his experimental dub-step/trip-hop sound in numerous releases each year since his first release, Hermetic Thriftology. Further raising his level of output, Jake has chosen to release these three albums in the span of only a month. I found Fade to be great and Fader is just as intriguing. Both albums are inhabited by all sorts of sounds and influences and are impressive displays of what the producer can put on show across one work, let alone three.
Fadest keeps the pace with its predecessors by including a number of tracks with hooks and sounds become pleasingly familiar by the second or third listen. This suggests the painstaking detail Jake attends when constructing his tracks considering the complexity of the music. In ‘Pearly Whites’, sounds quickly seep in, numerous tones fold in on themselves and a generally trippy soundscape introduces the final instalment. ‘Lest You Be Judged’ follows with voice modulation and echoes caused by delay on the vocals sampled throughout. Jittering sounds flow into an existence that pans across the stereo spectrum while a machine-gun like tick sharply whirr over the music, occasionally and momentarily dropping out.
‘Perennial Flight’ has a damper soundscape instantly riddled with multiple modulated vocal bits, both thick and thin synths and a smooth electronic equivalent to the xylophone doubling up some sections. ‘Ghost Hunter’ provides the basis for the album to start taking a step back as it transitions into ‘Wrist Wrist Wrist’, stepping toward something more old school in sound. Things get trippy again right after with ‘Under One Nation’ when reversed guitars and chorus vocals mix with their forward playing sources. Trip hop vs dubstep, or T-step, gives the right idea of what is going on here.
Guests make appearances here and there though they are’t always named as is ‘c12h17n2o4p’ which features a flow from an anonymous rapper with a curios ability to mirror the tripping rhythms of the music with his words. The aforementioned ‘Wrist Wrist Wrist’ and ‘See Lings’ feature Russ Liquid and Bläp Dëli respectively and both bring serenity and psychedelia to the already eclectic yet relatively subtle states of expression exhibited.
Along with Fade and Fader, Fadest is a powerful display of Jake’s mastery of creating complex but impeccably balanced soundscapes crowded with percussion, semi-industrial ruckus and clipped soul. The music is often fierce and indulgent like video games on DMT, fierce and indulgent. In this series of releases, Thriftworks demands that his presence be noticed and even suggests that he may someday join the ranks of royalty within this new world.
