Squares & Circles

An uncompromising return comes from Apparel Tronic: the internationally known Russian duo Scsi-9 is back with Squares And Circles an eight-track album. The eighth record in the label's electronic catalog is an abstract, geometric, but above all, analog journey through Anton Kubikov and Maxim Milutenko's souls; an identifying concrete work of research which displays the "two-dimensional and mathematical" approach of their connected minds. The whole double-LP is musically pervaded by all the sound investigations they made throughout the production period and tells of their inner perfectionism. Coming to the raw music itself, they succeed in a complex process of making simple what's extremely heterogeneous, embodying the psychological theory of the thought against the speech: it's easier to talk than to think. Well, they talk perfectly through their music which is really difficult to separate into tracks, being such a climax of organic emotions, flowing from the opening "No Rush" with it's tight rhythmics and space-y atmospheres to the more low-key and harmonious approach of "You & Me"; rolling on to the firmest and energetic constancy of side-B starting with "Get Some Lfo" and slowing down again with the meekest, warm, far-out sensations of "Stairs and Stars": this track is one of Scsi-9's watermarks on the album and it's a drive through an ascendant field of harmonies, peaking at it's zenith and oscillating back to a state of peace, letting the last beat taking over. Uncrating the second LP of the package, you access the substantial envelope of "Pha In The Hau" and "Systematic", a track that instantly takes you to an unknown region between the moon, Chicago, and Ivory Coast, dancing along to some sort of Zaouli tribe percussions. D-side brings the perspective to the edge of Scsi-9's universe gives you an even closer look to the landscape they've created with this treasure album. "303 Views" is the last wind storm on the Lake Michigan, touching all the musical influences that come from that specific area of planet Earth while the last blow "Onigiri" is a soft lysergic guided tour on their very own trigonometric asteroid, with no fear of falling off it. Squares And Circles is a determined, hard-lined, and intransigent statement of what Anton and Maxim want to communicate with their vibrations; no matter if you don't get the whole point, just plunge into the these waters.

Credits