Authentic celebrity of the recent techno wave, the Belgian Charlotte de Witte, after several EPs and countless dj sets scattered around the globe, arrives at his long-distance debut, a consecrative moment of a career capable of filling festival titanic like Tomorrowland, Time Warp and Sónar. It is a debut that is structured around two cornerstones: the powerful straight speakers and the bass lines that hammer the same eighth note (for those who have a minimum of familiarity with musical notation).
The result is a ritual with a winking flavour, which thrives on the contrast between muscular and enchanting, as in the almost frivolous melodies on more threatening rhythms (“No Division”) or in the arabesque vocalizations on acid basses (“Vidmahe”). The work, however, does not exude a vigor that goes beyond a refined but uninspired production. One of the main limitations, perhaps, is its skippability: you just need to listen to a handful of minutes to be able to say that you have gone through the song; and this happens for almost all eleven episodes of the disc.
It's true that minimal techno is based on reiteration, nothing to discuss. There producer he has repeatedly indicated Len Faki as one of his main inspirations, author of a more stratified rhythmic language and attentive to micro-variations. But cyclical return is an art to be handled with care. The ability to maintain the same cell for six or eight minutes without becoming tedium is played out in the subtle mutations, in the almost invisible filaments, which like chiaroscuro create friction. Here, however, the approach is simple, even too simple, almost didactic. It is often predictable, with that Roland TB-303, the acid line par excellence, which replies the same note as if to evoke a ride: worn effect, for which we could also invoke a change of wind.
This textbook predictability ends up rigidifying the path. There are glimpses of interest: “Memento Mori” is structured around a Gregorian chant sung by a female choir. But in most passages a mixture of clichés takes shape, between bionic voices and acid lines, again! (“Become”), up to the techno-hip hop hybrid of “The Heads That Know”, which reiterates the same eighth-note cell creating another banger already heard. And this is not an isolated case: several episodes of the album share almost interchangeable structure, timbres and progressions. A more defined glimmer appears in the “Higher” episode ambient breakbeat capable of generating a suspended tension which however cracks due to a slightly out of proportion singing.
The final impression is that of a job completed with little ardor, as if to say: I too want to be in the DJ club with an album under my belt. But perhaps his universe remains that of consoleBetween cdj and turntables.
25/11/2025
Antonio Santini for SANREMO.FM
