Latest on Luke Younger's Alter label is a beguiling set of edited electronic improvisations by the wayward French duo, Jo Tanz and Laurent Gerard (Él-G) aka Opéra Mort. The follow-up to their last LP for the sadly defunct Parisian record shop Bimbo Tower, 'Dédales' arrives a few years after Él-G's 'Mil Pluton' LP, and the pair's brilliant 'Globe Et Dynastie' side (seriously, go check this!) with cult French outsider Ghédalia Tazartès in the Reines D'Angleterre trio. Those facts should all give you some indication of the abstract, nether territory this LP occupies. It's a result of true electronic alchemy, two minds synched to the same code/language and sharing a taste for unique, visceral electronic timbre. Eight pieces all bristle with a nervous energy, finding a concentrated sweet spot between raw, hands-on experimentation and sophisticated, dynamic production, creating a space where the pointillist post-techno shudders of 'Les Spirales Messmer' sit cohesively alongside elemental electronic deviation 'Minéral', and the surreal lullaby 'Bâillon Rose' or the free-styling - but certainly not messy - geometries of 'Mille Viviers'. To decide whether it's techno, free-improv, avant-garde or whatever would be to miss the point; it's all of them and then some. RIYL Smegma, Rashad Becker, Ghédalia Tazartès, Ben Vida… Dédales by Opéra Mort
