[i:Vibes] Matti Laamanen - Live/Obsession [Tsunami Special Blend]

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Matti Laamanen - Live/Obsession [Tsunami Special Blend]

12:07 - October 1, 2004

by Ian

Matti Laamanen is widely regarded as Finlands hottest talent in the trance scene and this has been noticed by the amazing Tsunami label, as they release a 3 track record here, including a remix of Obsession by Luke Terry

Live (Original Mix)

Matti starts us off in a mellow fashion here with the basic kick & percussion sequence nicely worked to add more hi-hats, giving the track a good drive from the off. A melody meets us early on and delays significantly to give the all important echo factor that makes simple melodies sound really intricate. Taking nearly 3 minutes to build up with the melody, we are joined by a lovely soft string when it all calms down. Calmness is the key here as it sounds extremely peaceful and is graced by the lead on the top of this, along with a quiet but audible spacey-vocal sample. Whilst there is not an amazing amount of change in the track from start to finish, it still serves a purpose and is a solid offering in my opinion. 7/10

Obsession (Luke Terry Remix)

Geordie prodigy Luke Terry gets his first release on Tsunami with a remix of Obsession as the B1 track and hopes to bring us a new perspective to it. The start is very solid with a nice kick sample joined by some good usage of hi-hats, open and closed and a nice clap sample that makes a nice difference. At about a minute in we hear the bassline for the first time, low and changeable but also very good, joined by a delicate lead only seconds later. Filtering into this is a nice string and this becomes more prominent as the kick departs for the time being to rejoin a few bars later with the string stronger sounding and still building nicely. This all leaves us after doing it’s job, with a low deep string filtering upwards in a nice progressive manner and joined by the melody soon after, designed to make the hairs on your neck stand on end. An excellent remix here by Luke, and definitely a name to look out for in the future! 9/10

Live (Dusk til Dawn Remix)

Beginning with an almost spacey type pad, The elements such as kick and the percussive samples take a while to come in, which you’d expect from a tune that is almost 10 minutes in length. A lead comes in & out, and is weird to me, I can’t decide if I actually love or hate it, but this keeps on playing at the end of each 16 bar section. Getting slightly more complex as it goes, it takes nearly 4 minutes to really seem to actually make progress, this being when the kick leaves us. The percussion takes us onwards from here, being possibly the strongest part of the track to date. There is still nothing amazing however in the track, and even a stronger late section, which seems to take off more doesn’t really help it an awful lot. Sadly this doesn’t really do it for me at all, I love tracks which have a long subtle build up but even then they have to be able to carry themselves throughout and this does not manage to do so. 5/10 here.

Conclusion:
Overall a mixed bag, Lukes work is amazing and well worth a place in anyones record bag, but the 2 versions of 'Live' are a bit disappointing, and even though the overall score of the vinyl is 7/10, don't let it put you off buying it for Obession alone!