It was only a last minute intervention from the distributor that means these three new tracks arrive as Ed Davenport Presents Inland, rather than just Inland. Which is a shame, because it would have been fun guessing who was behind them. They don't immediately sound as if they're from the same studio that produced Counterchange, the Berlin-based Brit's recent debut album on NRK. Following on from that full-length, Davenport seems to have embraced techno more fully than ever before. It's a certain brand of techno, though—mysterious, epic and arching in narrative rather than just brutal, barrel-chested beats.
"Inland" itself is the most ambitious—a ten minute workout that could quite easily be the zenith of a set by Marcel Dettmann. Through great, harmonically filled spaces do stern kicks tread, echoing voices melt and synth chords swell, breaking occasionally to drop back into the groove before vast cymbal crashes and fizzing overhead wires add to the drama.
The same track gets a remix by Force/Emerge (which might well be Davenport too) and places more emphasis on a taut, bouncing, bassline phrase. It's the bedrock off which stuttering drums tumble and Detroit-styled pads soar, with plenty of pent-up UK rave/hardcore energy buried deftly in between. As a result, the downbeat and dubbed out closer "Rivers" seems even more blissful as its molten, multi-focus melodies dissolve to nothing over and over again.
Buy Ed Davenport Presents Inland - Inland at
  
Tracklist: Ed Davenport Presents Inland - Inland
 A Inland
B1 Inland (Force/Emerge Remix)
B2 5 Rivers
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