Bleep

Frenchman Fulgeance’s third album, released on his own Musique Large imprint, takes the sample-influenced instrumental hip-hop one might associate with a scene of LA beat makers grouped around the Brainfeeder label, and gives it a distinctly European sheen. Lead track ‘He Knows’ is particularly brave in its reduction of elements, a ticking-bomb hip-hop beat trading off with flanging organ washes in a manner which seems like a funkier relation of refined early Peverelist productions such as ‘Roll with the Punches’. Fulgeance should be praised for a fresh take on a genre characterised by the exotic timbral landscapes of artists like Flying Lotus and Teebs, stripping back the hip-hop template to an instrumental essence which has more in common with the sleek sound of Berlin Techno or French electro than the multi-layered ADD sampling one might associate with labels like Stones Throw.