Ace Ventura - Rebirth
First a note…
This was written at the back end of last year. I like to share my thoughts on what I’m listening and this album was so good that it deserves posting here. Also, sharing this is something I’ve been wanting to do for a good while and putting it up on this site for a while. So here goes!
Intro
Hmmmm we do not know what we’re dealing with here. Or so the meme is planted by this track and it certainly promises. Short at 1m53s, there’s no real melody, I mean, it’s just an intro but just tease and tease and some fat bass. The smile begins as your hearing exactly the sound that makes you go “this is going to be a good album.”
Serenity Now
Oooo the Intro runs straight into a big rolling fat sounding bass kick. The kind of bass that is a point mass, dark, a true singularity. Trombone-ing bass lines are layered on top as it ticks along at 135bpm. The groove continues. The track starts to come alive a bit more at the 1.54 mark. Still minimal sounding with the bass and the trombone-ing but some new phrasing is kicking in. There’s almost a tech-noir feel to this. Of course now at 3mins, more is happening - the layers are piling on. The intro meme is planted again, just for good measure, and there’s now a push to this - an early go-getter that gains momentum and drive. More detail is piled on then at 5.17 there’s a rush of energy and the bass changes. Treacle for the ears - the bass is glooping in.
I want to eat this track.
Psychic Experience
A hollow sounding start before the bassline starts. Sounds different to the previous track and that methodical bass is going at what appears to be the standard barometric 135. The beat increases till the main voices are started at 1.25. This track is incredibly well engineered. Actually scratch that - it’s incredibly well crafted. There’s detail all over.
It really is taking me somewhere by 3.30 – and reminds me of a long forgotten memory of when lived in Liverpool – a goth girl grabbed my hand in a darkened ally in the depths of Liverpool’s underground - off to an opening in the wall of an alley for the musical delights within. Oh what a good time that was! Where was I?
It communicates very well a sense of more to come. At the 5.19 mark there’s a real sense of impending delivery - the ears prick in anticipation - subtle melody creeps up from the swirling synth as more and more is added. Oh yes baby - show me what you got! It also doesn’t let up - energy and drive all the way passed 9mins.
Sao Paulo
Aptly named - definitely starts with a South American sounding beat before a cheeky change at the 1min mark - suddenly a bit more purposeful and darker. Listening to it you could easily be in the deep forests and it doesn’t take much to imagine Mayan warriors stomping around a tall fire. Ace is really delivering with each new tack. Mid stomping drums add a gusty feel to it. Definitely feels a top a temple that peeks out above the forest canopy – as you step and weave, close your eyes and picture the stars above, green tree canopy below - the sound of the forest audible between the beats. I just adore the sounds that are in at 6.30. Have to say - reminding me of a New Order remixed track - a real classic sound.
Stimulator
An interesting start - some very interesting samples being played that are lighting the lights in my deep memory storage. A gothy sounding wail that suddenly just erupts with more of that delicious fat pulsing bass that’s been EQ’d a bit, and an electronic/transformer whine. Lurv-ly - have some more of that thank you very much. This track follows the feel so far- I like dancing in the night and it just smacks of darkness - but not bad darkness – a velvety cloaked darkness full of harlequin masks.
Presence
We’re pushing onto the sixth track and Ace Ventura is really exploring the darker groove. This track is delicious. The sound is spatial, swirling, enveloping and pulsing as it swirls around before the eye of the storm passes and oh my hat. Big big big big thumping bass and high hats. This track is taking no prisoners as it stomps. It’s timed really well - we’re about 50 mins into the album and the brain has tone as its locked on and target pickled. Groove launched. Synthy waves cascade through this track trying to liberate the body from the hypothalamus’s control as by 5.40 we are really given a bombardment of sound. There’s real sweet variation and inflexion - 7mins is awesome.
Suddenly thinking of M.A.R.S Pump up the volume? No but … suddenly a slightly different sound. The previous acts had us pushing deeper, darker groovy sounds and now this is a turning track - a bigger orchestral sound. Rather than focusing on dark grooving beats this is more up - but still very, very technical. It’s definitely a climax moment for the middle tracks.
Tromboning bass is all around when then some new voices start near half way. It’s the chase, a don’t drive the bus under 55mph moment with Sandra Bullock at your side as it then rolls into more New Order like sounds - do I cut the red wire or the blue? I don’t know!!!!!!
The Light
We’ve definitely broken through. We’re treated with a dawning vista of clouds, shafts of brilliant sunlight - the day is coming and we’ve survived as we smile at each other. It’s slow starting compared to the other tracks. I find this track a little out of place right now - I was really enjoying the journey inwards - all the tracks up to this made you look within. This one is making you look outwards and I’m not sure I want that. Maybe it’s my mood. I like it - but it’s sweeter tasting than the dark savory fayre that’s just been sampled. Intensity is built up by midway with keyboards, hats, the bass is reduced apart from the now familiar trombonwa-wa-wa-wa-ing.
This is a cheeky track - at one point not my favourite - but at another a delicious listen and something to share. Yes, a sharing track definitely and sharing is caring!
Exposed
What can this track deliver after the previous mind benders? It starts off for over a minute with what is a concerted effort at a rush before the bass kicks in at 1.12. It’s a slowly layered track. The bass is going (again at the obligatory 135) but there’s a lot in the mid. Swoosh, swirl, reverb, some EQ’d bits and highs. Strangely I’m finding there’s too much going on and in places it hides the bass before it comes back in full force at 4mins. Then all is crystal clear and exposed - you’re thinking “hmm nice track” before Ace Ventura manages to pull a blinder with high grade stompy-grooviness.
At 5.12 you can’t stop moving. You were cheated into thinking the end had come but know - there’s still more to come and you’re not done with yet. This is definitely a day time track. New sounds that are uplifting - the hand that pulls you up.
You can probably guess from the above that I like this album.
Actually no - I don’t like this album - I think it’s absolutely amazing. It’s an incredibly well crafted, well thought out work. It’s almost opus like in that it stands best as a whole. Individually the tracks are good but string them together and a story is being told.
Like following the rabbit down the hole you go - deeper and darker for an adventure. There’s no let up. Ace Ventura must have been sitting tweaking and whittling away at this for a good while. I can’t think of an album that has taken me on this kind of listening journey - not in a long while (New Order Substance comes to mind but that’s cheating). Each track forms and extends the narrative.
This album is the bar setter of progressive trance, setting it at, in my view, a very high level. The problem with something like this is that there are those that come before, and those that come after – but few are truly comparable. Deep, purple coloured rich velvet sounds. Unlike some of the really good albums of late that are spectacular yet still have the odd weaker moment, every track on this delivers.
Album of 2007.
Go get it at:
So what’s next. Well firstly there are other notable mentions which will be put up, but we’re already a large part of the way through 2008 and there’s even more new releases. Watch this space…
