Octo Octa: Resonant Body (2LP, T4T LUV NRG, September 2019)

Aw, now, this is just deliriously good stuff. It’s acidy housey breaksy rave and, well, I’m not sure whether she was even born in ’92, but Maya Bouldry-Morrison knows her stuff. There’s all the right bloops and squelches, there’s Korg piano, there’s even a motherflipping hoover. Best of all, there are dangerously infectious vocal samples, cut up just the right amount. No, best of all is the production, which is absolutely note-perfect and just soooo damned pleasing. (Check out the way that Spin Girl, Let’s Activate! just goes ahead and slows everything down halfway through, and then brings it back up to speed. It’s utterly outrageous, but somehow here it makes total sense.)

I tried to list my highlights, and ended up with more that half of the tracks here. Move Your Body vies with the aforementioned Spin Girl, Let’s Activate! for the crown of absolute giddy banger. The breakbeat workout of Ecstatic Beat is impeccably rendered. Can You See Me? is perhaps the most straightforwardly delightful. And then there’s the ridiculous yet highly lovable album closers Power To The People, which somehow reminds me of Ricardo Villalobos’s remix of Señor Coconut’s Electrolatino, except way less minimal, obviously. Only one doesn’t quite “land” for me (the ambient My Body Is Powerful just seems a bit unnecessary). That’s a pretty impressive hit rate, especially given the range of material.

Actually, I’ve changed my mind: what’s best about this record is that, despite the obvious danger, this is very far from a cheap retro pastiche: this is a record with genuine depth and warmth. It’s a giddy head-rush in places, but it leaves me feeling satisfied, and you can’t say fairer than that.

I bought this from Rough Trade. They call it Techno.