Urulu dons his Liquid Earth guise and soaks in the psychedelic SciFi aesthetic of TerraFirm, a label which (at the risk of drowning you in name dropping) is related to Pittsburgh’s Is/Was and Was/Is labels. Microsmosis isn’t so much a techno record as a tour of 20 years through Rave Americana. Bursting with electric currents, vintage presets and breakbeats bouncing out of the bass bins, the Liquid Earth project has that same lust for fucked-up genre-bending and genre-blending as Flora FM, another TerraFirm cosmonaut. These records – it’s hard to believe they’re being made by more than one person given the consistency of vision – sound like the music of a serious record collector, the kind of guys who owns every rare original press disco record, only with techno, but a collector who actually plays them and wears them down to fuzzy scuffed vinyl into the run-out.
“Rhythm Remote” submerges the growl of an agitated 303 in the murky water of proto-UKG breakbeats and a ferocious jack. If that doesn’t sound good to you, it should. “Origins of Telluria” is a similar but distinct take on the same concept, lifting the 303 out of the mix and getting high instead on Drexciya and Model 500. You may be thinking that we’re stepping back into the age of navel-gazing spaceshit from this, but you’d be wrong: there’s a positive sense of awe here that’s infectious, the true joy of a musician having a good time with their toys. On the swaggering junkyard boogie of “Blade Runner” that spirit comes through even more clearly.
Liquid Earth: Microsmosis / TerraFirm / 12″ vinyl
A1. Liquid Earth: “Rhythm Remote”
A2. Liquid Earth: “Origins Of Telluria”
B1. Liquid Earth: “Bladerunner”
B2. Liquid Earth: “Momentium”
Everything That You Love: Originally published in 5 Mag issue 176 featuring Cinthie, Matt Masters, Stripped & Chewed, Marshall Applewhite & more. Help support 5 Mag by becoming a member for just $1 per issue.
