- '90s techno and electro updated by an expert UK student on a venerated German label.
- "I want this release to be Black and beautiful, to be queer and playful, a nostalgic nod to the '90s but also reimagining it in the current times," said British-Ghanaian producer Yazzus about her new EP, Black Metropolis. Her debut for long-running German label Tresor, which is one of the originators of the storied Berlin-Detroit connection, is the perfect home, and lands as part of the imprint's recent 30-year-plus hot streak of brand new and exciting material. You can hear influences meld from both sides of the Black Atlantic on tracks like "Metro City Bay Area," which mixes ghettotech with hurtling Millsian techno. It's frantic but funky, with a distinctly live, analogue feeling. "Human Error Processor" is a canny fusion of electro and techno that features stuttering vocals and the kind of hydraulic sound effects you'd hear on Drexciya's first few records.
Most of the instruments on Black Metropolis feel slightly dusty, almost vintage, but hardly lo-fi or explicitly retro—"Perforated," which has the most in common with contemporary hard techno, features odd, three-dimensional sound effects that splurt over the rhythm like gobs of jello. The closer "Three Deities" is probably the most exciting concoction of all, with a big UK bassline over Hardwax style drums. The percussion is so huge it practically blots out everything else, which means the synth lead just has to get even louder. This is tough, overwhelming stuff with a rhythm section that skirts between techno and electro so smoothly you barely even notice—only something a true and talented student of '90s techno could make sound so convincing and new.
Tracklist01. Human Error Processor
02. Perforated
03. Metro City Bay Area
04. Three Deities