Various Artists: Total 6 (original) (raw)

Recently, I was clicking through a music message board (you know the one), and spotted a thread entitled "Superpitcher Live In NYC". Turns out he travelled over from Germany to DJ recently. And the general consensus seems to be that he was good. But we've seen him play better.

How jaded we've all become in the last 48 months! In 2001, Kompakt's 10 or so CD releases were barely distributed in the U.S., their roster was a mystery (Michael Mayer? Jürgen Paape? Dettinger??) to anyone not paying close attention to post-Basic Channel German techno, and seeing any of them live in the U.S. (if they even played live) would be akin to catching a baby dinosaur walking down Avenue B at dusk. Some of those CD's weren't even that good! Will anyone stand up to make an argument for the ugly, blurting grooves of the first Schaffelfieber comp? Or the flat, gray Chain Reaction cribbing of Jonas Bering?

Of course, now Kompakt is huge: adopted by prog house and big-room trance jocks, hipster shorthand for techno in the 21st century, Mayer and crew regularly touring the planet. They were in Spin for chrissakes! 2001 was when that turn from anonymity to (a kind of) superstardom began, with the release of the Total 3 compilation. A mixture of disarmingly catchy vocal cuts and better-than average-intrumentals, Total 3 married techno and trance maneuvers to the kind of wistful, melancholic, or dark vibes that rock fans gravitate to in electronic music. (Cf. Aphex, Boards of Canada...hell, nearly all of the melodic side of IDM.)

By 2002, you could safely call Kompakt one of the most exciting labels in the world. For 12 months they knocked out one epochal record after another, be it artist LPs (Thomas Fehlmann, Closer Musik, Justus Köhncke, Kaito), DJ mixes (Friends, *Immer), or comps (*Total 4). The streak began to slow by 2003 when Total 5 debuted to middling reviews and, following a string of mediocre releases, its best record (Michael Mayer's Fabric 13 mix) wasn't even released on the label. 2004 saw its profile at the highest, with blanket press coverage and major U.S. DJ gigs for the Kompakt all-stars. It was also the label's weakest year on CD, with disappointing artist albums from Michael Mayer and Superpitcher, as well as the bloated, unrealized promise of Kompakt 100.

So it is with some natural trepidation that I approach Total 6, a 2xCD (uh-oh) collection of recent singles and exclusives. I grumbled and griped too, began to claim that they were being eclipsed by newer labels like Areal or Get Physical. I mean, obviously the zeitgeist has moved on, right? Microhouse is dead and everyone wants electro-house. Well, today I am a choad, because Total 6 is the best in the series since 3. Kompakt was never really microhouse anyway; leave that to your clicking, popping Perlons and Akufens. If any German house label was "electro-house" it was Kompakt. Just listen to Köhncke's "2 After 909", Closer Musik's "You Don't Know Me", or all those basslines. It's just that while they were electro-house they were a dozen other things besides.