Outstanding mix
C. T. Johnson | California | 02/18/2009
(5 out of 5 stars)
"Well chosen tracks carefully arranged into a thoroughly enjoyable and engaging mix of forward-thinking techno. I have been an enthusiast and bedroom DJ for many years, and I am just amazed with the quality of this work. Cannot find anything wrong with it. I think John Tejada is a genuine artist. I have done Fabric in London a few times, but never when John Tejada was playing, unfortunately. I bet it would be incredible to hear him drive that sound system."
Frayed Fabric
Mark Eremite | Seoul, South Korea | 02/17/2010
(2 out of 5 stars)
"I really liked Digweed's work with the Fabric label, and Luciano's was pretty good, too, if you can make it past the first, baffling third of the album. This installment, mixed by John Tejada (who I've never heard of before), has its moments, but it's mostly a dribbly sounding smear of minimal techno and beat-riddled trance.
I don't mind minimal, and in the right hands it can be spectacular. In the wrong hands, though, it can come across, at best, as if the album is simply unfinished. At worst, it leads to repetition, atonality, and a clash of rhythms and textures that ultimately leads to annoyance or boredom.
Tejada's mix sounds like it wants to be clever and fast on its feet, but instead of arranging a complex array of complementing sounds, Tejada sets up a few loops and switches them on and off without (apparently) much planning or forethought. The album's opener ("Let's Do It," by Dave Hughes) is a great scene-setter, and that scene stays fully lit and in place up through Namlook's darkly fun "Subharmonic Atoms."
Then, suddenly, the mix starts to froth over with bursts of cheesy electro-pop that just drag on and on until they decay into an array of songs with grim, undefinable hamonics that sound like they are meant to be weird for weird's sake. It creates this huge alienating patch between tracks 6 and 10, and only when Tejada pops in a few of his own personal creations ("Benus Boats" and "M Track 1") does the set start to develop a more coherent personality.
It's not much of a save, though. Tejada seems to rely a lot on musical coasting. There are little clumps of greatness (Tracks 1-3, 11-12, and 18-19), but most of it struggles with the obstacles typical to IDM (or EDM, or whatever they're calling it nowadays): lackluster repetition. Add to this that Tejada barely mixes the set: check out his clunky and unmelded transition into Orbital's "Fahrenheit 303" for an example of the worst kind of track cramming to be found on the disc.
Perhaps worthy of cherry-picking tracks for your own mixes, this album certainly isn't worth buying for the sort of straight-through listen it seems designed for. Try Digweed's instead."
Track Listings (20) - Disc #1