- Recently, I put this album on absent-mindedly and started working on something else. Near the end of the third track, "How You Look," having conveniently forgotten what it was I was listening to, my ears perked up: here was something that fit the 2011 neo-jackin' paradigm without sounding like it was trying particularly hard to. The 'round-the-drum-pad tom roll, splatting organ riff and plosive snare are an effective delivery system, and when you concentrate you can hear them looking back. But mostly I just liked the way it moved: streamlined but polyrhythmic, slinky but full, electro-like but with vocal snatches that imbue the track with real wit and mystery. I looked—of course. Luomo—that guy.
I hadn't been feeling That Guy for a while now, so it feels good to not only like Plus a bunch, but to like it for entirely different reasons than I liked him before. He still distends breathy, snapped-off utterances and coos through the mix—that's the project's major idea. But rather than the soft-focused opulence of the first two albums and its pair of more brittle follow-ups, here he opts to add his treatments to a bed more overtly electro than ever. Plus is his tautest album—it doesn't have the emotionally charged, dubby sweep of Vocalcity—few records do. But it's a welcome filling out of the drier Paper Tigers and Convivial, and part of the reason is that—yep—he's burying the vocals more and making the instruments the focus.
In that sense, Plus is as much a reaction against Convivial's more overt pop leanings as Vocalcity was against the idea of a gulf between experimental techno and soulful house. That said, it's got its songful moments: new wave is a big factor on "Make My Day" and the lovely "Void in Form.""Good Stuff" starts off similarly early-'80s stiff, but at the minute mark, videogame percussion ricochets into the sound-picture and takes the track into warmer territory, as little synth riffs pile up all around. Mostly, though, the words are there for texture. "I must do the twist," guest singers Chicago Boys moans over and over on the opener, "Twist," but the blocky synths that form like icicles all around the vocal catch the ear more. Whatever it's become, it's good to know he's still got it.
Tracklist 01. Twist
02. Good Stuff
03. How You Look
04. Make My Day
05. Happy Strong
06. Medley Through
07. Form in Void
08. Immaculate Motive
09. Spy