''Present'' is the third album by German

techno Techno is a genre of electronic dance music (EDM) which is generally produced for use in a continuous DJ set, with tempo often varying between 120 and 150 beats per minute (bpm). The central rhythm is typically in common time (4/4) and often ch ...

duo Sun Electric, released in November 1996 by Belgian label Apollo Records. The duo's first full-length studio album for the label, the album is a return to Sun Electric's more beat-oriented material and incorporates styles of dub,

jungle A jungle is land covered with dense forest and tangled vegetation, usually in tropical climates. Application of the term has varied greatly during the past recent century. Etymology The word ''jungle'' originates from the Sanskrit word ''jaṅ ...

, IDM,

breakbeat Breakbeat is a broad type of electronic music that tends to use drum breaks sampled from early recordings of funk, jazz, and R&B. Breakbeats have been used in styles such as hip hop, jungle, drum and bass, big beat, breakbeat hardcore, and UK ...

and

downtempo Downtempo (or downbeat) is a broad label for electronic music that features an atmospheric sound and slower beats than would typically be found in dance music. Closely related to ambient music but with greater emphasis on rhythm, the style may ...

. The album artwork by The Designer's Republic features a manipulated image similar to artworks of

Madonna Madonna Louise Ciccone (; ; born August 16, 1958) is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Widely dubbed the " Queen of Pop", Madonna has been noted for her continual reinvention and versatility in music production, songwriting, a ...

, reflecting the melancholic, fractured sound of the album. Music critics greeted ''Present'' favourably, praising its inventive style, and some have since recognised the record as overlooked.

Background and composition

Sun Electric, consisting of Mac Loderbauer and Tom Thiel, formed in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

at the advice of their manager

Thomas Fehlmann Thomas Fehlmann (born 1957) is a Swiss composer/producer who lives in Berlin, Germany, and has been active in electronic music since the 1980s. He is currently active on the Kompakt record label based in Germany. Fehlmann is an on-and-off member ...

, and were considered pioneers of

ambient house Ambient house is a downtempo subgenre of house music that first emerged in the late 1980s, combining elements of acid house and ambient music. The genre developed in chill-out rooms and specialist clubs as part of the UK's dance music scene. It w ...

upon their emergence in 1990, drawing praise from fellow producers

Alex Paterson Alex Paterson (also known as Dr Alex Paterson, born Duncan Alexander Robert Paterson; 15 October 1959 in Battersea, London) is an English musician and co-founder of ambient house group The Orb, in which he has worked since its inception. Life ...

and

Jimmy Cauty James Francis Cauty (born 19 December 1956), also known as Rockman Rock, is an English artist and musician, best known as one-half of the duo The KLF, co-founder of The Orb and as the man who burnt £1 million. He is married to artist and mu ...

The Orb The Orb are an English electronic music group founded in 1988 by Alex Paterson and Jimmy Cauty. Known for their psychedelic sound, the Orb developed a cult following among clubbers "coming down" from drug-induced highs. Their influential 19 ...

. After releasing their debut single on "O Locco" on Paterson's Wau! Mr. Lodo label, and negotiating a failed contract with

ZTT ZTT Records is a British record label founded in 1983 by record producer Trevor Horn, Horn's wife and businesswoman Jill Sinclair, and ''NME, New Musical Express'' (NME) journalist Paul Morley. The label's name was also stylised as ZANG TUMB TUUM ...

, Sun Electric signed to Apollo Records, a subsidiary of

R&S Records R&S Records is an independent record label founded in 1983 in Ghent, Belgium. R&S represents the initials of Renaat Vandepapeliere and Sabine Maes, the couple that created the label. R&S Records has had several subsidiaries, most notably Apollo Re ...

, and released their debut album ''Kitchen'' (1993). This was soon followed by the mini-album ''Aaah! CD'' (1994) and the live album ''30.7.94'' (1995), which featured co-production and "mentoring" from Fehlmann. Sun Electric produced ''Present'' in Berlin, with Fehlmann again acting as a musical consultant. He is credited in the liner notes as "Global Energy Consultant." ''Present'' is a sophisticated,

-styled

album infused with

dub music Dub is an electronic musical style that grew out of reggae in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is commonly considered a subgenre of reggae, though it has developed to extend beyond that style.Dub: soundscapes and shattered songs in Jamaican re ...

, featuring heavy synthesised stings and elements of

ambient music Ambient music is a genre of music that emphasizes tone and atmosphere over traditional musical structure or rhythm. It may lack net composition, beat, or structured melody.The Ambient Century by Mark Prendergast, Bloomsbury, London, 2003. It u ...

. Fragmented and melancholic in style, the record also features hints of

and

serial music In music, serialism is a method of Musical composition, composition using series of pitches, rhythms, dynamics, timbres or other elements of music, musical elements. Serialism began primarily with Arnold Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique, thou ...

, and is more beat-oriented than the more relaxed ''30.7.94'', with most tracks eschewing the

trance Trance is a state of semi-consciousness in which a person is not self-aware and is either altogether unresponsive to external stimuli (but nevertheless capable of pursuing and realizing an aim) or is selectively responsive in following the dir ...

-style rhythms of ''Kitchen'' and ''Aaah! CD'' in favour of a

-based IDM approach, according to writer Sean Cooper. Regardless of the jungle influences, few of the album's rhythms are reducible to

drum and bass Drum and bass (also written as drum & bass or drum'n'bass and commonly abbreviated as D&B, DnB, or D'n'B) is a genre of electronic dance music characterized by fast breakbeats (typically 165–185 beats per minute) with heavy bass and sub-ba ...

, with subtler beat layering and "rhythmic eruptions" comparable to experimental ambient techno acts like Tournesol and The Black Dog.

Critical reception

''Present'' was released by Apollo on 25 November 1996. The Designer's Republic provided the album photography and artwork, with the album cover "constructed of ribbons of the same image bitmapped with various digital texture." '' Insomniac'' ranked the cover at number 75 on their list of "100 Best Electronic Music Album Covers", with writer Dennis Kane writing: "Almost like a

painting, but with the head horizontal not vertical, the art is fragmented and melancholy, like the music." In a contemporary review, Sean Cooper of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

named ''Present'' an "Album Pick", writing that while some listeners would criticise the perceived "jungle trendiness" of the album's "breakbeat, IDM tip", he found the album's rhythms more inventive than in that few of them are genuinely "drum'n'bass". Gert van Veen of ''

de Volkskrant ''de Volkskrant'' (; ''The People's Paper'') is a Dutch daily morning newspaper. Founded in 1919, it has a nationwide circulation of about 250,000. Formerly a leading centre-left Catholic broadsheet, ''de Volkskrant'' today is a medium-sized c ...

'' wrote that with the album, the duo "leaves its own mark in ambient and

dance Dance is a performing art form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoir ...

." He found the album to build on the styles of ''Kitchen'' and ''Aaah! CD'', despite the passing musical climate, and wrote that the music is "subtle and adventurous," hailing how "even though the listener is regularly confronted with surprises, the album never ends up in endless experiments." He also felt the title was ironic as the album contained "hardly any echoes" of contemporary genres like

trip hop Trip hop (sometimes used synonymously with "downtempo") is a musical genre that originated in the early 1990s in the United Kingdom, especially Bristol. It has been described as a psychedelic music, psychedelic fusion of hip hop music, hip hop ...

and drum and bass, and that by "precisely by drawing their own line so clearly, Sun Electric has conquered its own place, which the group consolidates with this beautiful album." ''Zitty'' magazine described ''Present'' as a beautiful album "in a class of its own." In a 2013, Tim Purdon of ''

Fact A fact is a datum about one or more aspects of a circumstance, which, if accepted as true and proven true, allows a logical conclusion to be reached on a true–false evaluation. Standard reference works are often used to check facts. Scient ...

'' included ''Present'' in the magazine's list "The 15 greatest techno albums you've never heard: Part 1", commenting that he finds the "classy" album to have "stood the test of the time much better than, say, '' UFOrb'' or ''

Chill Out Chill-out (shortened as chill; also typeset as chillout or chill out) is a loosely defined form of popular music characterized by slow tempos and relaxed moods. The definition of "chill-out music" has evolved throughout the decades, and generally ...

''." In 2015, ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to th ...

'' included "Stimpak" in the list "Emotional Intelligence: A Guide to Melodic IDM", with writer Philip Sherburne saying that by the mid-1990s, Sun Electric had become "masters of elastic rhythms and silvery leads." He hailed ''Present'' and its follow-up ''Via Nostra'' as "underrated masterpieces of late-'90s

electronica Electronica is both a broad group of electronic-based music styles intended for listening rather than strictly for dancing and a music scene that started in the early 1990s in the United Kingdom. In the United States, the term is mostly used to r ...

." Dennis Kane of ''Insomniac'' reflected that the album has been "slept-on." ''Project Revolver'' named it one of the 22 best techno albums between 1989 and 1999.

Track listing

All tracks written by Max Loderbauer and Tom Thiel, except "Waitati Post", written by Loderbauer, Thiel and

. # "Spreewald" – 4:29 # "Stimpak" – 3:34 # "Eya" – 5:13 # "Parallax" – 3:46 # "Bagatto" – 5:50 # "Crystal Ballore" – 7:30 # "Goldstuck" – 4:56 # "Quaila" – 5:36 # "Waitati Post" – 6:08 # "Tassajara" – 6:03 # "Wassa" – 4:16 # "In Vitro" – 5:46 # "Uschba" – 4:27

Personnel

Adapted from the liner notes of ''One World'' *Max Loderbauer – production, writing *Tom Thiel – production, writing *

– writing (track 9), music consultant * The Designer's Republic – artwork, photography

References

{{Authority control 1996 albums Sun Electric (band) albums R&S Records albums Albums with cover art by The Designers Republic Breakbeat albums Electronica albums by German artists