Dimitar Dodovski is quite a new name to the international netaudio scene. I became aware of him when he released his "Internal Affairs EP" on aeronautique last year. Unfortunately, the Berlin based Techno & Ambient label decided to take down all its past releases from its website, and Dimitar's debut doesn't even seems to be available on Archive.org anymore. This is sad, as it would deserve some more attention.

But there are good news for friends and fans, as the excellent and well-established Tropic Netlabel released Dodovski's second EP some days ago, and the Macedonia based musician proves to have evolved immensely since his 2009 mini-album. There's no doubt "Fiction Makes Sense" is one of the most ambitious releases the team around Daniel Tischer has given life to so far. Leaving behind traditional recipes and formulas of conventional dance music, Dimitar Dodovski melts a bunch of different musical influences including Dub, Electro-Funk, Electronica, Glitch, Techno, and IDM into one interesting and richly coloured sonic universe of his own.

The opener "Nitetime" acts like a summary of what to expect from the following four tracks: Extremely complex and sophisticated rhythmic structures form a dense foundation to wafting thick soundscapes, interweaving themselves to a rarely seen sonic completeness. But Dimitar Dodovski even gets a lot more experimental with "If We're Apart", a track which blends Arabic chants, loops and harmonies into a casual frame of deep Dub chords. Another highlight of "Fiction Makes Sense" is the wavy "Larva, Larvae (false)", showcasing the artist's very original "art of stumbling" with its bumpy beats and warm, lush pads, that wash through your speakers like electronic flotsam.

Dodovski created an extremely fine piece of musical architecture, in which you'll find new aspects each time you put it on. A truly original work.

Dimitar Dodovski - Fiction makes Sense | Dimitar Dodovski on MySpace

 

Dominik Paß knows electronic music. He grew up with the emerging scene of the German media capital of Cologne in the early 90s and sporadically publishes both electronic music and phonetic poetry under his real name and various pseudonyms such as Liquid Diffusion, Sapere Aude!, and Serve & Destroy. But he does not only produce music, he also studies the theories behind it and shares his insights in his written publications: on abstract electronic music, on phonetic poetry, and on Break- and Speedcore in his doctoral dissertation.

One of his (way too) rare vital signs in the netaudio scene is the not less than brilliant "Transcendere LP" from 2006, which has been released on the excellent German netlabel Dreiton.net. Although Paß explores known territories like Ambient, Minimal Dub, and Dub Techno with it, he finds uncharted spaces in these genres, opens doors for further investigations and thus paves the ground for thinking artists. It's striking that Paß moves between these different approaches to electronic music, dense rustling soundscapes, lugging beat constructions, and minimalistic harmonies with the most impressive ease, without ever losing the focus on the overall coherent sound of the whole album. And while his debut is a didactic play of precise composition techniques, detailed sounddesign, and the integration of all of these aspects into one harmonic picture, it never bothers its listener with a sterile, an all too systematic or even indoctrinating style, but stays soothing and emotionally stimulating at the same time.

Dominik Paß' "Transcendere LP" sums up the essence of electronic music in its purest form: it perfectly reflects the digital environment of its listener's actualities of life while eluding itself from any secularistic methods of comprehension - and therefore lends itself to the "staging of counter-worlds", as Dreiton itself puts it so very tellingly.

Dominik Paß - Transcendere LP | Dominik Paß' biography on Dreiton.net