Funkstorung
Appendix
K7!
The remix has become a fascinating musical outlet for many producers and electronic acts, primarily as it is most often a medium with which the remixers can expand upon or further define their signature sound and style.
For the now defunct electronica duo Funkstorung, whose remix work was much in demand by artists as disparate as Jean-Michel Jarre and Wu-Tang Clan, this meant liberally applying their glassine tones and skittering beats while sprinkling in elements of the original song, usually a keyboard or bass hook.
The most well-known of their remixes is their reinventions of Bjork’s lilting ode “All Is Full Of Love” (one of which is featured on this collection). The original whispers through the stratosphere, pushed gently along by strings and harps. In the hands of Christian de Luca and Michael Fakesch, the song is no less rhapsodizing, but instead lumbers along in a fuzzy, rattling haze. The Icelandic singer’s voice is often pushed far into the background, singing from a cavernous hold within the high tech high rise that the duo built atop the lush forest she once resided in.
The remixes don’t seem as revelatory as they did when they first were released in 1998 – especially in retrospect of the groundbreaking work that all three artists have done since – but it is still gratifying to be reminded how unafraid Bjork is of having her music turned inside out on occasion and how smart she is in choosing who gets to do the imploding.
The majority of the other tracks on this posthumous collection don’t do much to take a song apart, preferring (most likely at the remixee’s behest) to make sure recognizable elements are there so as not to worry the artist’s fans. For example, The Raveonettes’ “Love In A Trashcan” maintains the original’s rockabilly guitar licks and disaffected vocals, but matches them with a tinny, pop-lock beat that threatens at times to disintegrate into a million pixels. Elsewhere, the original fluttering, music box backing track of Lamb’s “Heaven” is eschewed in favor of a gurgling shuffle while still retaining Lou Rhodes’ slinky vocal track.
Funkstorung: http://www.funkstorung.com
