Ephemeral Exhibits

While the American DJ/ Rupture has been propagating the Skull Disco school of dubstep – with emphasis very much on the DUB – for quite some time now (see his recent mix Uproot, which made many a critic’s – including yours truly’s – albums of the year list), there hasn’t really seemed in evidence anyone over the pond whose productions exude the kind of braggadocio-fuelled confrontation which so much of our indigenous two-step bass music contains (perhaps an unsurprising by-product of a genre propagated almost exclusively by young men).

Now, though, A U.S. citizen looks to have finally found the wobble, and he’s making better use of it than Caspa or Rusko ever did. Not since Vex’d committed Degenerate to wax (I realise I always refer to said duo when reviewing anything related to dubstep, but not doing so would be equivocal to discussing religion without referring to monotheism) has a full-length unrelentingly packed so many punches. There’s nothing verbally explicit on this record, but it should surely contain a parental advisory warning because any listener who pays any attention throughout this L.P. will certainly come out the other side bruised.

Starkey draws extensively from the form and sound palate of ostentation familiar from the jump-up Dub Police set. This is evident from the outset with ‘Gutter Music’, a track which emerges on the wave of immediacy and arrogance of a party-crasher and doesn’t let up this energy throughout, its two-step beat calling to mind an agile boxer hopping from foot to foot as he ducks and dives.

This sense of self-importance is typified in the album’s towering monolith, ‘Dark Alley’, which appears relatively early on in proceedings (in a move which could be seen somewhat as the premature blowing of his load – personally I am always reluctant to continue with the record after this track, instead content to leave it on repeat indefinitely). This is a track which knows how sick it is and fucking revels in it. An assault of unrelenting synth stabs; coarse undulating bass; soulful vocal snippets soaked in self-promotion (e.g. “Because of me!”) and a beat which initiates with a steady strut and culminates in an affront of percussive clatter.

Similar to his Venezuelan Lo-Dubs brethren Cardopusher and Pacheko, though, what he constructs with his foghorn-synths and grimey basslines tampered with spasmodic LFO betrays a compositional sophistication which transcends the laddish swagger of his cockney counterparts. While Starkey might not be content with the pure cerebrality of Boxcutter, don’t expect him to stick to the same time-signature throughout the entirety of a track.

In addition to this, Ephemeral Exhibits features a handful of numbers which are far more contemplative and moving, throwing the record’s overriding bombast into relief. Most notable among these are ‘Miracles’, which comes off like a dancefloor Burial with its ethereal pitch-shifted vocals; and album finale ‘Spacewalk’, a subtle tribute to 4/4 house which again recalls Burial (specifically the track ‘Raver’ from his second album Untrue) and – presumably inadvertently – references Dario G’s ‘Sunchyme’ in melody.