Kopfuss Resonator

"spect-® module" (Album, 1998)

First impressions with this album are great name, great sleeve and great title. Being a boot fair purchase (for £1!), this immediately put me on a low-expectation footing - after all, with some much going for it before I'd even heard a note, I found it difficult to believe that the musical content could be up to the same cool standard. Kopfuss Resonator make trance music - something that doesn't feature heavily in my personal collection but it does feature. This is full-on high BPM trance with little concessions to the chill-out side of the scene, with most of the ten tracks coming in at over seven minutes each. Track one, VPM Groove kicks off straight in the middle of a deep, pumping sequencer and is progressively joined by percussive elements and the inevitable hi-hats; and the majority of the remaining nine tracks follow a similar structure.

Redsprite features a Star Wars Tie Fighter-like 'scream' effect and sampled voices and rapidly sounds alarmingly similar to to dream of love from Underworld's second toughest in the infants album - in fact, 'a rip-off' is perhaps a more accurate description. Reboot merely comes across like a remix of Redsprite, but Kein Traum is one of the better songs with a memorable sampled voice repeating the track title and an another excellent driving groove. Other pieces have a slightly more tribal drum feeling, whilst Cold Fusion reminded me of Esplendor Geometrico's Nador album. Despite the deliberately simplistic structures and some of Kopfuss Resonator's influences showing through too starkly, overall it's a pretty good album - not particularly challenging and thereby relatively easy going - a good introduction to trance for those who might put off by the more hardcore side of things. 6/10

Rob Dyer