Slum (2) ‎– Make Rainbow In Your Slum

After one of Phi duo has passed away (AFAIK; don’t know the reason) the other one has continued alone as Slum. Being considerably bolder and more unrestrained than in team, Slum still does honour the good traditions.

“Make Rainbow” album is a dark night full on in which there’s more than just darkness, nightness and full-on-ness. Melodies tend to sound so naïve sometimes (“I Can Eat All Of Earth”, “Trust Youth Days”) that—no matter how paradoxically this sounds—it starts to feel like Slum is as serious as no one else.

“Future Is Ours” is the best track to choose as an opener-teaser as it showcases much of the tricks that are to be met next, on the one hand, not giving any of them a chance to fully expose, on the other. The overall message is “continue listening for more”; however the track is quite solid on its own.

In “Sneak, Beneath My Notice,” Slum goes too far in his experiments with sounds so that you just can’t listen to the second part of the track due to physical pain. “Follow Me” is a wonderful full on track for the dance floor. With the trademark Phi-Slum sound it still manages to appear very positive and overall happy.

The title track “Make Rainbow in Your Slum” can be for sure called no less than _fundamental_. This is how night full on is defined this year, if not upon the whole. The final run is so genius in its simplicity and so delicious in its killing unfinishedness that you can listen infinitely to it, and that won’t be even closely enough. This is indeed a ground-breaking stuff.

Slum's Make Rainbow In Your Sleep picks up the stick where Phi left it. There's not one dull moment here. You wanna dance? Okay, I'll pack the dancefloor with full-on basses and melodies. You wanna trip? Okay, I'll add enough speed and psychedelia craziness to give your mind something to trip on.

If classic psychedelic trance music works because it's too odd to be plainly comprehended, Slum works because there's so much going on it's physically impossible to comprehend it fully. There's simply not enough time. Whatever the reason, I'm thoroughly entertained with Slum. In my feet as well as my mind.

Recommended for psy-trance lovers looking for lasting full-on. This is a safe purchase. If not better.

In 2004, a pair of Japanese psy-fanatics surprised many with their shockingly good debut album which seemed to come out of nowhere. Phi caught the attention of many with their own unique blend of modern full-on power coupled with a full assault of old school goa madness. What the album lacked in sonic clarity was more than made up for in pure energy, which they called “Nu Skool Hard Goa”. In 2005 the duo parted ways to work on their individual solo projects and Shuji, one half of Phi, has now resurfaced under the name Slum with his debut album titled (in his typical Engrish style) "Make Raibow In Your Slum", on Japan's Elf Music. Some artists, when branching out on their own, try to completely sever themselves from their previous work, so it will be interesting to see what happens here.

With in 10 seconds of the start of Future Is Ours starts is clear that Slum seems to have fully embraced the sound he helped develop in Phi and is trying push it into new areas. Comparisions with Phi are simply unavoidable. The bass is back, the kick is back, the slightly shuffled hi-hats are back, the thick dirty synth leads are back and the general madness is back. That is not to say that Shuji is simply covering old ground though. The production is much clearer and there are a number of new elements introduced into what he now calls the "Hard Gore" sound (on a side note, this is simply a play on words as Goa and Gore are pronounced the same when rendered into Japanese pronunciation). The most obvious difference to my ears is in the "supporting" sounds. There are more "clean" sounds in the mix here, from pads, to squeeky mini leads. The sound isn't quite as layered and thick all the time and the flyby effects, pads and general weird noises are a lot more spaced out and clear, where as in Phi there was a general assault of thick, morphing and pitch shifting stuff going on most of the time. The breaks and builds are also generally a lot bigger and badder (in the good sense of bad), a classic point being the track Make Rainbow In Your Slum, which has a wonderful lead and a big break down that is sure to bring any dancefloor to full boil.

I Can Eat All Of Earth and Emog gives us a mess of atonal noisy blasting leads while Never Runaway Never has more of Shuji's trademarked dirty guitar-ish styled synth tweakage. Why You Have My Beer? No Problem has some nice delay tweaking on a lead that is straight from the gosspel according to Phi. Sneak, Beneath My Notice goes hard and focuses on a wide range of cool, dark and evil fly by noises to keep things driving. Follow Me pulls out back out of the depths of hell sonically while keeping the same driving feeling going while Trust Youth Days is probably the thickest track sonically, with lots of layers and and ever changing array of leads, pads and effects to attract the ear. Over The Revolution brings things to a close as the only vaguely chill like track here. Rather than trying to be some sort of downtempo number though, this one works by being a deeper mid-tempo track that you could both chill to, or dance to depending on the situation.

As I said before, comparisions with Phi are simply unavoidable, but luckily those comparisions are all good here. All and all Shuji has obviously taken the experience he gained performing live the last couple of years to create an album that will definately storm on the dancefloor, but at the same time still keeping the music well above being simply dancefloor filler. Fans of Phi will find plenty to love here, but this is an album I'd recommend to anywho who wants some good pounding music that doesn't sound the same as everything else out these days. Highly recommended.

Slum's sound is very close to Phi's one, at the little difference the tones are less polished, more twisted. You almost always find a funky bass & frequently electric riffs. Now here are some specifities in each track:

1> Welcome, welcome seems to says the 30' intro in Future Is Ours with a big mischievous smile. I don't know if it comes from an old olympic games or a military musical band but it makes your eardrums fully open as it's a totally unexpected way for lauching the album.
2>From 2'15 you're submerged uder a fireworks of sharpy tones then with the break appears 2 new leads, one floating in the background & the lead one is very hacked but in the same tone quite soft.
3>Some brassy tones comes from 3'28. As it's the longer track (9'09), the tune evolves & turns into more cosmic morning & light on the end (from 7'54) .
4> There's a barking lead around 1'10. The attraction takes form under a robotized lead from 2'40 to 3'30.
5>It's more retained at first.On the final, there's an interesting fx on the electric riffs from 5'05.
6>There's a break based on a windy or reactor sample just a after short mewing (at 3'30). Otherwise, this tune is the one which looks like the most to the Phi's productions at equality with track1.
7> The rythmic is more hard-tek influenced (from 1'10) & the lead is more dark-noisy-apocalyptic (from 3'00); indeed globally here the atmosphere is more raw.
8>Come back to more usual Slum harmonies with a focus here on the metallic leads, like from 1'50 with this highly muted metal lead. It's a Mad stuff, but the public enjoy as their applause attest at 3'44. Then a little trick appears in the rythmic, it's like a photo-clic sound when you push the button to take a picture.
9> There's many sounds in the background, from 2'16 it reminds the sounds in the metro. Here the guitar lead is hugely streched at 3'50.
10> Last but chill one progresses like an urban walk under a night & starry skyscape.

Ok, so if you were a Phi's fan, i think there's 90% of chance you'll enjoy this Slum's album too, the surprise in less.
For those who still don't know Phi's sound, let's describe Slum's sound as "hard-neo full on-goa".
Favourites:2,7,8,10