Bleep

An arresting sleeve from legendary Detroit graphic artist Abdul Qadim Haqq provides a perfect introduction to Derek Carr’s Contact LP. Backlit by a solar flare, the figure on the album’s cover is possibly human, possibly alien, possibly robot - or maybe even a combination of all three - and is set against a twinkling cosmos. It’s a perfect visual metaphor for the music of Contact, an album which invokes the noble Detroit techno tradition to spark both imaginative whimsy and hopeful visions of the future.

Even though his affinity is firmly with the traditions and rituals of dance music, Carr’s output often has a gentle, ruminative quality to it. This is put to use better than ever before across Contact’s eight tracks. While the programmed drums and little shuttles of bass here keep the grooves moving, the synth pads, keys and extraterrestrial blurts of noise that Carr knits together atop invite you to sink into deep thought. It’s a trick Carr has learned from techno’s foremost figures - Juan Atkins, Jeff Mills, James Stinson - and one that makes Contact just as worthy of home listening as it is of dancefloor deployment.

Derek Carr’s 2018 LP Contact, a cult classic of modern techno, gets a new coloured vinyl repressing courtesy of Subwax Excursions.