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Michael Mayer | Immer

Mellifluous funk from the new capital of German techno.
CD, Kompakt

Tekst: Omar Muñoz-Cremers

Publicatiedatum: 30 maart 2002

With this exquisite mix-CD, techno enters the springtime of 2002. Lightness of touch, vapors, birdcalls, and an almost kinesthetic feeling of the smell of sunlight made audible . . . it's all courtesy of Kompakt's second mix-CD release, 'Immer,' which works like a loose follow-up to Tobias Thomas' great 'Für Dich' mix from 1999. Like that mix, Mayer doesn't present a label overview (only Thomas Fehlmann's 'Gratis' is a pure Kompakt release); instead he opts for a survey of a scene loosely based around Cologne, and a myriad of labels and artists that are associated with Kompakt, such as Italic, Playmade, Ladomat, and Force Inc. Mayer gently mixes his records into one another, creating a pleasurably evanescent funk. Upcoming techno man-of-the-year Akufen is represented with his 'Psychometry Vol. 3.0,' and there's a bit of dub action from Phon.o, whilst Fehlmann is gliding on a Maurizio tip. A personal favourite is the impossibly light 'Rocket No. 3' from A Rocket In Dub, one of those lovely minimal tracks with an ether-like melody that sways in such a way as to become rhythmically more important than the beat itself. Only Phantom/Ghost's 'Perfect Lovers' fails to enchant: Its use of Mahler's Fifth Symphony is too much of a forced humanistic gesture in this sleek technological landscape. It's a small bug in a mix that offers a worthy summary of the state of German minimal techno at the beginning of 2002, and at the same time forms another chapter in what slowly is shaping up to become the Year of the Mix-CD.