Towa Tei
Towa Tei
Flash
(V2)
New York-based Japanese DJ and soundboard knob-twiddler Towa Tei presents an accessible, if often super-light, collection on his fourth album.
The man himself says his mixes are hard to categorise in style. Different record shops have them in different specialist dance sections: techno or house. 'Fun children's music for adults,' is Tei's own description.
Certainly feel-good in style, the kicking Melody, featuring Byron Stingly, will be on house-night play lists this summer. But, like the rest of the album, it has mass 'pop dance appeal'.
A collaboration with Kylie Minogue, Sometime Samurai, is a lightweight disappointment, mainly due to the singer's vapid delivery and its throwaway lyrics. It lacks the more measured sensibility of the stripped-down, futuristic electro of Risk Some Soul, which features the sultry vocals of mysteriously named female singer Agf.
Then, there's the distinctly Continental Europe-flavoured Bianco, a study in contemporary bossa nova with male Spanish vocals from poet Arto Lindsay.
Funk with thumping bass, skewed horns and sensual female scats makes Hunter Green a likely floor filler.
Perhaps the hardest track to get into is the cut-up Congo, co-produced by Atom, who also provides spoken lyrics, as does Aya Hirayama.
Covering The Knack's My Sharona in a true-to-the-original version is an unfortunate and pointless end to an otherwise listenable album.