atonal: cithare

Following last year’s often praised “EMU” Electro Music Union, Sinoesin & Xonox Works compilation, Cold Blow is unearthing more Metatone affiliated material from the formative years of British techno. The EP is, for the most part, unreleased and unheard music circa 1994 by Kieran Warren aka Atonal. It appropriately bridges the 27-year gap in output by headlining the release with the only previously released track, “Cithare”, which featured on a Metatone Recordings compilation as a teaser of what was to be his solo release on the same label. The planned debut never saw the light of day due to sudden folding of the label but fortunately, a lot of the material Kieran produced survived on archived DAT tapes. Clearly not immune to the influences of its era, considering the music was produced in the first five years of the ‘90s, there is still plenty of originality to be found. While the title track conjures up the melodic patterns of Selected Ambient Works married with the rawness of Universal Indicator, the rest of the EP takes a more broken beat approach. “Malago” and “Cluster” send us floating into dimensional space with ethereal pads harnessed with rolling breaks. As if almost an antithesis of its title, “Northern Soul” takes us to a more sinister direction which sounds like Mike Paradinas after a particularly rough ragga evening. The EP closes with a heartwarming drumless vignette that is “Saw Her Yesterday”, perhaps giving us clues of things to come. After all, the label has announced that a full-length album drawing from the same tape archives is expected later in the year. A must have for the fans of early Aphex Twin.