Record Review: Idris Bena - Passagem
Idris Bena feat. Lourene - Passagem [Forest ill Rec]
As its name suggests, Idris Bena’s recent digital release Passagem represents a transition from the hyped up French school party music of last year’s 12s on Opia and Rakya, towards something rather more intriguing. Gone are the 130+ bpm tempo and rave signifiers, making room for musicality and a more complex tone and mood. And while there were already flashes of this kind of work in the dnb closer to that Rakya EP, ‘Now I Float’, and the smattering of downtempo tracks on Bena’s 2020 LP Lankivei, there is a coherence to Passagem that makes it more of a statement: “this is where I’m at now”. I’m far from an aficionado of downtempo, so don’t expect any deep canonical references in this review. Instead what I can talk about is the reactions these tracks inspire in me, which it turns out are rather mixed.
One of my main misgivings with a lot of this kind of music - and indeed with Passagem - is how easily it can cross the line from cool and chilled into kind of uncool, and even a bit cringe-worthy. These tracks are full of thickly reverbed vocals telling us to relax and close our eyes, nature noises like oceans and dolphins, the occasional ‘exotic’-sounding instrument. All of these things I find off-putting, making me yearn for the more down-to-earth approach to generating atmosphere practiced by the likes of Detroit Escalator Co..
Yet for all its oversteps into new age silliness, there are also real moments of unforced musical feeling here. ‘Blue’ is a track that leans heavily into the things I mentioned above (dolphin calls and all) and yet, emerging in its final moments is a light, musing piano solo that contains more emotion than any of the other elements earlier in the track. It’s all over in about 20 seconds but for me it holds an immense amount of potential. On the following track, ‘Highlife’, Bena conjures a metropolitan soundscape from the opening sound of an engine starting, a streetwise trap beat, funk bass and the rap samples that see the track out. I suppose this is just as referential as the new age stuff elsewhere but it comes off as far less trite, and therefore more successful.
Most of the album features vocals from Lourene, and I suspect these will be a dealbreaker for many listeners. Mostly in English but at times (like on ‘Conversa’) in Portuguese, they’re generally whispered or moaned, à la Donna, and run through plenty of effects. For me, when they work they really work, like on the R&B slowjam ‘Feel Your Love’. Here the whole point of the track is seduction, so the come-on delivery and soft-focus treatment make total sense. But on ‘Our Connection’, for example, the vocals tend to distract from what is otherwise a carefully balanced piece of music - indeed, they tip the spacey vibe of it back over into the new age territory that, without them, I think it would happily avoid.
Album closer ‘Ride’ immediately put me in mind of another producer making inventive outsider dance music: Devroka. It sounds like it could be an 80s new wave instrumental but played with a contemporary sound palette, just like some of the work on Devroka’s Crystal Misterioso from a couple of years ago. This is fertile ground, which, in the absence of all the accoutrements found on the preceding tracks, succeeds purely on its own musical merits: classic and creative harmonies, clever solos, and smile-raising call-and-response between the different parts in a strong overall arrangement. It finishes the LP on a high and is perhaps part of the reason I’ve found myself putting the whole thing back to the start so often these past weeks.