Q lives up to his namesake
on ‘Digital Mix’
By Shawn "Speedy" Lopes
slopes@starbulletin.comÜberzone is the brainchild of Southern California producer and remixer Q (named for James Bond's high-tech gadget man) who, in addition to generating numerous LPs, EPs and singles under the Überzone moniker, has reworked tracks for BT, Keoki, Herbie Hancock, the Crystal Method and Sarah McLachlan.
"The Digital Mix"
Überzone
Moonshine Music
A fair portion of the Überzone sound borrows from electro greats of yore (i.e. Afrika Bambaataa and Soul Sonic Force, Planet Patrol, etc.), but remains relevant in the post-acid house age of electronica with a thoroughly modern method of beat-making, which utilizes a combination of turntable mixing and computer-generated production techniques.
While Überzone's dizzying array of unintelligible utterances, gizmo-assisted bleeps and buzzes, and pounding rhythms succeed in pricking the ears of its listener, it takes only a minute or so for the novelty of each song to wear thin, making the remaining three minutes of each track seem like a mere follow-through. Occasionally, voices will blurt out such non sequiturs as "Science is the surface," "Watch it" and "Kick a hole," which make no obvious sense on their own but sound good under a hail of tweaky blips and synthetic breakbeats anyway.
But this is not to say the album doesn't have its moments. Überzone shows it is capable of re-creating the same kind of cold Teutonic funk Kraftwerk once produced, and even when not recalling those great-grandaddies of electronic music, Überzone's inventive studio techniques make for interesting listening. In "Kung Fu," Q digitally manipulates DJ Davey Dave's scratches over a shuffling "Tour De France"-like rhythm and succeeds in birthing a strange, engaging, otherworldly noise. On Forme's "Kick a Hole," he dissects the famous line from Eric B. & Rakim's "Microphone Fiend" ("I kick a hole in the speaker, pull the plug, then I jet"), flips it and turns it into a dynamic rhythmic device.
If the ideas demonstrated on "The Digital Mix" are any indication of what's to come from Überzone in the near future, I'd keep my eye on Q.
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