Artist ...... : Jack Sparrow
Title ....... : Circadian
Genre ....... : Bass
Label ....... : Tectonic
Catnr ....... : TECCD009
Source ...... : WEB
Quality ..... : 320kbps avg / 44.1KHz / Joint Stereo
Duration .... : 00:54:43 (125.MB)
Ripdate ..... : 06-10-2010
Store ....... : http://beatport.com
Tracklist ... :
1. Jack Sparrow - Loveless 5:09
2. Jack Sparrow Feat. Ruckspin - Dread 4:08
3. Jack Sparrow - The Chase VIP 4:36
4. Jack Sparrow - Salvation 5:07
5. Jack Sparrow - Terminal 6:17
6. Jack Sparrow - Shoal 5:07
7. Jack Sparrow Feat. Indi Kaur - 6:03
Subterranean
8. Jack Sparrow - Dune 5:11
9. Jack Sparrow - Relapse 5:33
10.Jack Sparrow - Regress 5:11
11.Jack Sparrow - Exit 2:21
Release Notes :
The "dubstep album" is a difficult thing; it's no coincidence that the best are
only tangentially related to the genre. Burial's albums were spooky garage,
2562's Unbalance unstable techno, Kode9's Memories of the Future steeped in dub,
Guido's Anidea leaning towards grime and poppy songcraft... You get the
picture. Frankly, dubstep's dank and meditative vibes are not really album fare.
Edges and borders bleed between six minute chunks of moody dread, and the
experience can easily become an hour of plodding monochrome.
Leeds producer Jack Sparrow's debut is a good "dubstep album," though, and it
doesn't even have to step very far outside of dubstep to accomplish this.
Circadian is dubstep through-and-through, its bleak greyness silhouetting a
stunning journey rather than a muddled mess. Circadian refers to a circadian
rhythm, the roughly twenty-four-hour cycle assumed by living things, and the
album indeed has somewhat of a progressive arc, though it's more likely to
invoke the idea of a story rather than properly weave a tale.
Jack Sparrow's success is twofold; one, his music feeds on its own endless
tension. Sparrow makes dark, brooding tracks, removed from contemporaries who
use wobbling or snaking LFO bass for release. Instead, Sparrow lets off steam
through his intricately layered percussion, as well as occasional brief
outbursts (the moment of erupting breaks on "Relapse" is particularly
breathtaking), rarely looking up from his heads-down stance. Secondly,
immersion; his world might not be immediately accessible, but its gaping chasm
is easy enough to fall into. Circadian lacks mid-range, consisting mostly of
drums and miles-underground sub-bass. It draws the listener in, becoming the
forced center of gravity: the drums don't merely pound and clink, they surround,
enchant and conjure.
And conjure they do; Circadian is the voyeuristic view of someone's subconscious
wrestling with personal demons, a journey through a frightening dreamscape where
the only comfort lies in knowing that they're not your own dreams. The gentle
bassline of "Loveless" induces sleep, and the bottom drops off completely with
the guttural tribalisms of "The Chase VIP" and "Terminal," culminating in the
gurgling ugliness of "Subterranean" and "Dune." The album's most arresting
moments come at its end, where the vision turns from hazily hallucinogenic to
fantastical; "Relapse" and "Regress" are excursions into some mutant form of
drum & bass, reaching obscenely high BPMs as they practically lift off the
ground.
The journey ends in motionless suspension with "Exit," a title which suggests
escape but delivers nothing but excruciating purgatory. This cliffhanger ending
might not quite complete the album's circadian rhythm cycle, though it's hard to
fault Sparrow when he's achieved something so remarkable: a dubstep album that
doesn't compromise. Circadian uses its bleak greyscale to explore new levels of
reduced brilliance. The dubstep album is a difficult thing, but apparently not
for Jack Sparrow
Tracklist: Jack Sparrow - Circadian
01. Loveless
02. Dread feat. Ruckspin
03. The Chase VIP
04. Salvation
05. Terminal
06. Shoal
07. Subterranean feat. Indi Kaur
08. Dune
09. Relapse
10. Regress
11. Exit