Matthew Dear: Body Language Vol. 7

Berlin's Get Physical has always been one of the

most overtly pop-oriented of this decade's big dance-music imprints, and the

seventh volume of its DJ-mix series is selected by Matthew Dear, who's best

known for the vocal-driven work he releases under his own name. But Dear is

also known for his abstract instrumental work, and that's the guiding principle

behind the 20-track mix Body Language Vol. 7, which doesn't feature a

prominent vocal until halfway through. An odd one it is, too: the gurgled croon

of Mlle Caro and Franck Garcia's "Dead Souls (Radio Slave Long Distance Kiss

Mix)" sounds as dreamy and detached as the rest of the collection. Sometimes

that just means it pumps away in a relatively straightforward manner, as with

SoulPhiction's "Traffic Lights." But the peaks are the more overly psychedelic

likes of I:Cube's "GTNUP," in which vocal shrapnel flits by like a surreal

cartoon, and DJ Koze's "Zou Zou," whose pan-pot tune and gurgling timbres are

so hazed-out that they make Panda Bear's Person Pitch sound like the Ramones.