RJ Valeo - September

The best way to describe this album is… cold. Melodies are based around drones and long hissing tones that just generally sound very absent. They sound nice. Real nice, in fact. RJ is a fantastic producer. He sounds like he really knows how to get the sound he wants out of his equipment. Everything is EQ’ed beautifully. That may be part of the problem I had with certain parts of the album. Sometimes I feel like its style over substance. Key word here is sometimes. Certain parts of the LP are absolutely stunning. When things come together for RJ, they really come together quite nicely.

His sound does not sound contrived or stolen at all. This is far from generic IDM but I can hear the influence in the music. I can also hear hip hop, house and many other forms of electronic music. Type does a good job choosing artists who make music that is influenced by the artists they like, not a direct rip-off or mashing of the sounds of said influences. The album is good, and I really look forward to hearing RJ improve on this but sometimes I really don’t mesh with the songs at all though. That said, when RJ is good, he’s really fucking good.

-Laurel Near
March 4, 2004

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