When Gui Boratto first emerged on Kompakt he was the perfect fit, making the kind of woozy techno which would blatantly be called trance had that genre not headed down the fluroro route on the label which had a delightful penchant for it. Nearly a decade later and both Gui and Kompakt have moved forward but still retained that ethereal edge, and this is again mining that space age trance sound. Joker is a synth driven techno pile driver, shimmering in swathes of beauty and lush piano chords to create a record that you can close your eyes and picture yourself knee deep in the high point of a DJ set from James Holden or Laurent Garnier. Bliss, in a word. Remix wise Dave Dk drops the pace brilliantly, creating a haunting yet melodic effort which shuffles along at an almost snail pace before erupting into an astonishing breakdown; hard to see how it would fit in the majority of Dj sets but a great piece of music nevertheless. Kompakt head Micheal Mayer also gets to grip with a brilliantly subtle effort, an almost ominous beginning making way for the synth to take centre stage, before utilising those pianos by themselves on the breakdown. A brilliant EP.
