The Big Pink's Tapes

It seems like fate or destiny that Milo Cordell has mixed the latest installment of !k7's Tapes Series. The Big Pink production mastermind has been making compilations ever since he was a kid. "Doing this mix was a complete pleasure because I grew up recording mixes for myself and friends," says Cordell. And, in some ways, not much has changed. Then, as now, the idea was to conjure up a mood. "My goal has always been the same, " he explains. "To make something that transports you somewhere completely different."

And that's exactly what he has done on Tapes. If fans were expecting a fantastic upfront barrage of tunes, they would be grossly mistaken as much of his Tapes mix is a dark, downtempo trip into the recesses of Cordell's soul. Tapes spends at least two thirds of its time rattling around in dark spaces and making the kinds of noises that will scare small children at night. Tapes plays more like some sort of dark goth record than something you'd expect from someone known for their upfront electro rock. With all that in mind, I'm not really sure how I feel about this record. At times it offers glimmers of hope but most of the songs here just seem a bit too atonal, dreary, and creeped out to be any good. Mixing electro, dubstep, and just pure noise, the artists that make up Tapes will either drive you up a wall or make your eardrums bleed.

From Gang Gang Dance, to Active Child, to Salem, and oOoOO there's a bit of everything that's grimy, somber, and depressing. The over running theme throughout this record, is to compile the latest generation of artists from the States who specialize in making this kind of anti-depressant inducing music. And lets just say after 19 tracks of this stuff I'm pretty convinced they're good at...almost too good at it. While I am most definitely in touch with my inner goth and raver, so much of Tapes has no tune to it that it's just about unlistenable. Tapes suffers because it's just plain annoying and there's so much racket going on that I had to take to Tylenol just to make it through the whole thing. Tapes is rough stuff that's only for the fool hardy or masochistic and I hope to God that the new Big Pink album sounds nothing like this.