Arto Mwambé has firmly established himself as the joker of the European house scene. The difference is he doesn't drawl "why so serious" out of the side of his mouth. Instead, he yells it with a beer in hand then falls over the decks as his lurid party house music blares. Well, if he really was just one guy he might. After a recent gig at Panorama bar, we now know the fictional Burkinabé character was created by Phillip Lauer and Christian Beisswinger (CB Funk), who run Brontosaurus along with Thomas Sabrowski (Saap).
But there's good music to back up the jokes. When you hear these tracks you may realise you'd been sitting in an uncomfortable position during the last year or two of purist circlejerking that's seen producers and critics raging over who ejaculated first. There's a lightness and fun to this music that suggests dance music doesn't have to look inward as much as it has been of late. The track that you may know already here is "Une Seule Nuit (Mix De Danse)." It's a record where Mwambé brings the the party energy of fidget or electro to deep house. That may sound repulsive to some but the result is still actually quite faithful to the pop spirit of early acid tracks. Mwambé loops an indistinguishable but catchy vocal over a fat imprecise bassline, fading it into a weird but eupohric chorus of sounds without words. The sloppiness is paradoxically perfect, a study in the imperfection of swing. It's got more energy and colour than practically anything else released this year.
Of course Mwambé can also be serious when he wants to. "Btwo" on the flipside sees him in disco mode, harking back to his first Brontosaurus EP. It's a slow and clean groove with walking bassline and repeating house pads, a lazy track in a good sense. All the attention will be for "Une Seule Nuit" but this is still a skilled, if wildly different companion.
We may know Arto's true identity, but his character is still vividly painted in these tracks.
Published /
Tue, 07 Oct 2008
Buy Arto Mwambé - Ouverture Antenne at
  
Tracklist: Arto Mwambé - Ouverture Antenne
A Une Seule Nuit (Mix De Danse)
B Btwo | 
