Tin Man Ode

What does a rave sound like the next day? The strobe lights in a dark warehouse, the pounding kick, the blur of ecstatic faces lead to a morning-after emptiness, all fade into memories of the friends you once had. On Ode, Tin Man (proper name Johannes Auvinen) explores this feeling, offering tracks which possess an exhausted joy, the aural equivalent of the stretch of time beginning when the last record is played and stretching on towards the doleful contemplation of last night’s unmade sheets. Appropriately, Tin Man’s melancholic dance music is more club-ready than ever. The opening tracks explore the spacious atmosphere first proposed on Neo Neo Acid and the (recently repressed) Acid Test 01 collaboration with Donato Dozzy. Auvinen continues to coax unique, bittersweet sounds out of the 303 - his control is akin to a virtuosic theremin player, all dramatic lunges and dynamics. Yet on tracks like Depleted Serotonin, the memories of half-remembered nights surface. That track reprises the minor-key rave breakdown, ending with nearly three-minutes of knackered techno throb. Similarly, “What a Shame” sounds like a forgotten Warp classic run through Tin Man’s palette of tasteful reserve. Always conceptual, Tin Man is commenting on big room techno music by presenting his thoughtful, hungover version of it. On Vertigo, he reins in the acid box acrobatics - opting instead for a rudimentary, early-Chicago style pattern, eventually following optimistic chords skyward.