rene hell / three legged race

Violin Petal (Auden) / Whipped Secrets

*Arbor pair off the indomitable Rene Hell and Hair Police's Robert Beatty for a compelling synth workout made in a limited vinyl-only edition* Rene Hell has become a regular feature on these pages over the last 18 months with a slew of crucial tapes for Agents Of Chaos and LPs for Type and Pete Swanson's s/t imprint, each opening portals to his sound from alternate angles. The latest vision is 'Violin Petal {Auden}' a four part suite of ritualistic sci-fi synth music, borrowing from contemporary minimal techno and early tape music in order to propel the listener great distances without moving an inch. He may be bound by bedroom recording practices but Rene doesn't let that stop him going to the ends of the universe, locked in an unending spiral sprawl of unraveling synth patterns with a strangely vivid narrative. If that side was about the journey, Beatty's Three Legged race side is like the arrival on some unknown planet, starting out wide eyed and agog with alien folk melodies and garbled, indecipherable voices attempting to make contact before the scale of the mission sets in and we're on isolationist tape music territory, richly evocative of the Radiophonic Workshop or Morton Subotnik - but is this real or a VR simulation? From here til the end the melodic landscape becomes more fragmented and pixellated with an unpredictable logic sounding like it was programmed at Keith Fullerton Whitman's labs back on Terra, while the feeling of being stranded out starts to become more appealing. If deep space missions are your thing, this one is worth your undivided attentions. Pressed in an edition of 400, housed in glossy jacket featuring images by each artist and printed inner sleeves and centre labels designed by Jeff Witscher. Just ace.