Tom Trago - Iris (2011)

posted by record facts

The Dutch producer returns with a mix of techno and vocal house that is gorgeous on the surface but harder to crack on a deeper level.

Arriving in the context of 2011 dance music's taste for niche, Tom Trago's new album Iris feels almost refreshing for its "broad church" style of eclectic populism. It wanders through a variety of dance sub-genres (admittedly all variations of house and techno) with that air of assumed ownership that used to be the hallmark of big statement dance music albums in the late 1990s. It wasn't ever thus: the Dutch producer's 2009 debut, Voyage Direct, was a rigorously focused throwback to lo-fi second wave Chicago house disco loops, as tunnel-visioned as any purist could hope for. Whether intentional or not, Iris feels like a stab at main stage crossover by comparison, a short-circuit bid for the kind of statesmanship long enjoyed by Carl Craig.

Iris even sounds like the kind of album Carl Craig might make if he got down with vocal house more intently. It cycles between dreamy, spacey, exquisitely produced mood pieces and surprisingly upfront but still painstakingly airbrushed vocal house (this time splitting the difference between first wave Chicago and brassy New York divatude), all wrapped up in a sensibility of rhythmic looseness swiped from 80s R&B. The rhythms are the album's key drawing card, fluttering and flexing with delectable voluptuousness-- a surprise given the uncompromising straightness of Voyage Direct. Trago also has a light touch with gently murmuring basslines and sweeping synth chords, wrapping them around his rhythms like so many layers of fairy floss. In fact it's difficult to think of a recent dance album so unabashedly pretty at all times, deploying its top-shelf production nous to caress, rather than impress, its audience. The gorgeous, delicate Metro Area shimmy of "Being With You" is a particular delight.

All of which should make Iris pretty compelling indeed, and I've puzzled long and hard over why it's, somehow, not. The short answer is that the vocal tunes that ought to provide the album's highlights are almost uniformly underwhelming, capturing everything but the bittersweet euphoria that is vocal house's most noble contribution to culture. On moments like the stagey soul of "Suckers For Fools" (whose repetition of its title could move less patient listeners to acts of self-harm) or the classicist diva workout of "Gave Me the Love", Trago is nothing if not scrupulous, pulling out every possible production trick and arranging with infinite care and attention to detail the succession of melodic and sonic motifs that confirm he has studied the masters. But the key to crafting truly transcendent dancefloor anthems is to conceal within them an indefinable intensity-- physical, emotional, or preferably both-- that can't be reduced to their sonic signifiers. Trago comes close to this only once, on the aching and undulating synth-disco strut of closer "Corrupt".

It's not that Trago can't do intensity. Although I'm not sure that it was the superior album, at its best Voyage Direct certainly generated a great deal of dancefloor friction. But his advance on the center stage takes him into territory well-worn with the footprints of giants of the form. To complain that Trago struggles to match the anthemism of Armand Van Helden, the lush soul of Moodymann, or the sheer physical presence of Paperclip People may be unfair, but, well, life is short and filled with great records covering the same beat. You'd probably be better served spending your time with those records, but if the prospect of inconsequential but exquisitely constructed tributes to past glories appeals, then Iris' eagerness to please probably won't lead you astray.

Track listing

1.  Life Of Plants & Flowers - 4:37

2.  Being With You - 3:36

3.  Space Balloon - 4:02

4.  What You Do  (Featuring Tyree Cooper) - 4:52

5.  Rootstopia - 2:14

6.  Suckers For Fools  (Featuring Olivier Daysoul) - 3:28

7.  Watch Me  (Featuring Meikbar) - 3:17

8.  Gave Me The Love - 4:49

9.  Soon In A Cinema - 1:57

10.  So Cold  (Featuring Om'Mas Keith) - 2:59

11.  Steppin' Out  (Featuring Romanthony) - 3:46

12.  Scent Of Heaven - 5:28

13.  Joys Of Choice - 3:19

14.  We Like Noam - 1:01

15.  Corrupt  (Featuring San Proper) - 4:28 

Companies, etc.

• Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Rush Hour Recordings
• Copyright © – Rush Hour Recordings
• Pressed By – Docdata

Credits

• Art Direction, Design – Marco Sterk
• Music Consultant – Christiaan Macdonald, Tom Trago
• Photography By – Bart Oomes, Bram Spaan
• Written-By, Producer, Mixed By – Tom Trago

Notes

Release:  2011

Genre:  House, Electro

Length:  53:59

Label - Rush Hour