Sasha - Invol2ver

The long-awaited second volume of the Involver series from Sasha is finally here. Has it been worth the long wait? Most definitely, and this time round he’s advanced the original concept – rearranging all the individual parts of the tracks he requested for the mix as he sees fit and adding his own textures to them – by adding even more of his own sounds. From vintage synths to old guitar pedals, they’ve gone all out with trying to make this a really unique compilation.
 
Only problem is for a reviewer like myself – I don’t know most of the tracks involved, so I don’t really know what’s been done to each tracks or added or rearranged. What I can tell you though is that it’s a beautiful, gripping piece of work that will disappoint few. We kick off at a languid tempo, flying gently through the incessant, trance-lite arpeggios of Telefon Tel Aviv’s You’re The Worst Thing In The World, its graceful, soft vocals gliding over the top of its stripped-back but deeply emotive electronica sounds. Rone’s Flesh pares down the emotion to a more subtle degree of intensity, big swathes of pads softly sweeping through the reverbed, big room atmospherics, before the bubbling bass of Sasha’s remix of Eclipse by Ray La Montange creeps in effortlessly.
 
Things take a deliciously proggy twist here, with the moody bass and eerie, heavily-effected vocal slithers of Sasha’s remix of Adam Parker’s Lowlife, coming across like some classic, Breeder dark progressive house circa ’99, but with a contemporary edge in its intricate percussive rhythm. Before long, the familiar tones of Aparat’s Arcadia cut through the murkiness, its stabbing, retro-techno melodies somehow sounding both strong and fragile at the same time over shimmering, stuttering beats, and delicately poised, church-like pad sounds. Then out of nowhere some glorious Thom Yorke vocals are drafted in, adding a whole new layer of musicality to this mix. Their trick works: the vocal sounds like it never belonged anywhere but on this track – their seamless and note-perfect fusing of the two one of the most admirable moments on the album.
 
A sea of acid bass greets us on Home Video’s equally haunting That You Might, and then one of the highlights – the warbling, heady female vocals of Ladytron’s Everything You Touch You Destroy, again harking back to the glory days of prog and trance with its moody, sombre, druggy ways. French nouveau proggy rockers M83 are shown as a stadium trance act on Couleurs, all epic drums, bright, resonant euphoric synth notes held for two bars at a time, segueing beautifully into a triumphant rework of Thom Yorke’s Eraser. A grand finale comes from the slow-building, twisting, winding 3 Little Piggies – and the big, gruff bass and crashing drums of Engineers’ Sometimes I Realise
 
It’s a superb piece of week that demands repeated listening and will become more enjoyable with each listen as you familiarise yourself with the various parts of the journey. Fans of Sasha’s “classic” sound will be pleased with how the mix harks back to his prog-meets-trance sounds of old, and fans of his more contemporary tones should be equally satiated by its clever mixture of electronica and indie vocals. Epic is the word.