REVIEW: Dirty Art Club’s “Hexes”
You get me to a release that is all-samples, and I will absorb it until I become the ink of its tattoo. I have become aware of a duo who call themselves Dirty Art Club. Madwreck and Matt Cagle have done projects that would be closer to hip-hop, but for the 8-song Hexes (Phonosaurus), they’re taking sounds that would normally mot be called (or considered to be) hip-hop influences, but by default, almost anything and everything can be turned into a funky track. However, this is not hip-hop music, but rather it shows how sampling technology has made it possible for artists to take “borrowed sounds”, digitally turn it into new paintings and sculptures and show the link between what was used for something else, and how it’s used today. For anyone into sample-based and electronic music, Hexes will make you smile simply on how it was put together and what was used. You don’t have to know what every single source is, but I’m sure the idea of what it could be will make the hairs on your nape stand up with delight. Plus, all surface noise, crackle, and dig marks remain indeed, nothing too spectacularly clean. I could easily come up with two or three different albums that are similar in nature and call Hexes the bridge between this and that and also that, and maybe it is. It’s simply a part of the vast pool of creative music by wise musicians who know what they’re doing, and I’m sure it was done with technological confidence and a few smirks, as they probably can’t believe how some of this came off. In other words, some damn good music you can trip off to, funky when it should be, intense listening in other parts. Well done, gents.
What do you think?