Kompakt Germany
2007
Honig Pumpe
About This Album
After Visions of Blah was released, Thomas Fehlmann went nearly two years without issuing any solo material on Kompakt. However, he was as occupied as ever during this period, working with the Orb, producing the excellent downtempo/abstract hip-hop album Lowflow for Plug Research, and continuing to cross the planet with his laptop sets. Less reliant on previously released 12" material than Visions of Blah, Honigpumpe -- or "Honeypump," an homage to German artist Joseph Beuys, who used honey to symbolize social force and the transfer of thoughts and ideas -- nonetheless uses the 12" releases Little Big Horn (2004) and Emo Pack (2006) as its foundation. Like Visions of Blah, this album supplies a combination of dubby techno, slightly gnarled shuffle-tech, and open-sky ambient. With rare exception, it maintains a tone that is relatively brighter than Visions while leaving the impression that the beats are lighter and a step more swift. The intent to make a slightly softer set of tracks geared even more toward home listening seems apparent in "T.R.N.T.T.F.," a gentle reworking of Emo Pack's "The Road," where the beat -- which originally carried a chunky, prodding heft -- is softened into a cushiony thump, while the harmonica sampled from Canned Heat's "On the Road Again" is transformed into a specter.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and 9)

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