A new album from GAS – aka Kompakt co-founder Wolfgang Voigt – is the stuff of dreams, it being a full 17 years since the last one! And dreams are what Narkopop conjures up. These are darkly coloured – as you would expect from the name and the deeply textured artwork – but they are beautifully realised. Voigt has a way of conjuring up timeless spaces in music that nobody else can match, letting the thick chords hang in a suspension of almost pure stillness. And yet development still occurs, through very subtle changes of rhythm, texture or what melody there is. ‘Narkopop 2’ takes an orchestral Nocturne by Claude Debussy as its start point, creating a rich picture, while ‘Narkopop 7’ is a study in one gorgeous, major key chord. Experienced as an album, ‘Narkopop’ is a head cleanser of depth and rare beauty, Voigt striking gold once again.
Ben Hogwood
5 out of 5
