Sasha has been steadily producing exquisite releases over the past few years. His debut artist album Airdrawndagger was arguably the most anticipated electronic release of that and several other years. Involver sufficiently raised the bar for original mix albums, almost creating a genre in itself. And both Fundacion and his Instant Live: Avalon sets showed that pretty much whatever he sets his mind to releasing will have a high stamp of quality.
But original material has been slow to come. Airdrawndagger was years in the making, and "Seal Clubbing" with Charlie May, although a good track, felt like an Airdrawndagger leftover (and very well may have been). Now with the release of several new tracks on his new emFire label, we're finally seeing some new material. As well as a new progression of sound.
The first release from the series is "Coma," and sets the stage for what should be a very interesting and dense EP's worth of music.
"Coma" is a dark, rumbling, and twisting dance track. Those familiar with Airdrawndagger and some of the deeper cuts on Expander will obviously recognize it as Sasha. But stylistically it perhaps fits most closely with the overall feel of his Avalon set, which centered around a more breaks-inspired progressive house sound, although, as always, through Sasha's stylistic filter. The end result was a sound that found its interest almost through hypnosis; the tracks maintained a consistent style, and sucked you in to a dark, but luxurious mid-tempo lushness. It wasn't a Friday-Night mix, and neither is "Coma" a hands-in-the-air single. But it's unmistakably Sasha, and unquestionably gorgeous.
And this is perhaps the most interesting thing about "Coma", that it seems like it would be difficult to work into a peak-time set in its current form. Although underpinned by a constant heartbeat pulse, it comes across as a very cinematic track, finding its arc and journey through an ever-evolving bed of high production and subtle, if dirty, beauty. But it could easily be remixed as a proper stormer, which makes me wonder if there won't eventually be "proper" releases that include remixes.
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