Man Power

Man Power

Man Power is the incognito artist whose illustrious output on John Talabot’s Hivern Discs has produced rumours he may be the man himself, with similar whispers circulating about his identity deducing Michael Mayer, Tim Sweeney and others with a turbo-charged, genre-bending aesthetic. His self-titled debut produces a wide angle shot of his work and brings his true identity into focus.

 

“The best way I can describe the process of making this album is like doing a jigsaw puzzle, in the dark, but you have to cut out the pieces yourself.”

 

While his work to date has displayed a notable range of tempos and textures, Man Power’s eponymous debut album takes a deeper exploration into his leftfield influences, citing touchstones as diverse as Laurie Anderson, Steve Reich and Tangerine Dream in the ungoverned, acid keys of ‘French Basic’ and ‘Boys Beware’. Shadowy membranes and haunting guitars reign in the rebellious ‘Bielsteiner’, while the convoluted rhythms and expansive pads of ‘forget to remember’ could exist in the visions of Aphex Twin (taking a lowercase bow to American writer ee cummings).

Moistened with heedy breathing spaces that revolt from the tempo in ‘Lude’ and the languid ‘Hunting Swan’, Man Power masters varying shades of jazz, techno and Balearic, probing a new and almost pop sentiment that manages to swing back and forth between doleful to playful over the course of a compact fifty minutes.

The album speaks in a number of voices, but still ultimately communicates as one singular whole, its conclusion dextrously rooting its varying themes in one place. This is not merely a collection of club tracks, hastily compiled and capable of living in abstraction, but instead a true album wherein each element services the finished article, and where each new track provides further context for that which proceeded it.

 

“When I first started the Man Power project, I’d always envisioned it as being based around an album, and I was lucky that Correspondant gave me the time to work on it properly. If there’s a common thread running through the album it would be ‘naiveté’, hopefully this comes across. I’d be lying if I didn’t say I wanted people to like the album, but ultimately it’s me at my most honest, so it simply is what it is and it couldn’t have made anything different even if I tried.”

o+ Since first appearing as an anonymous, online presence almost only 2 years ago, Man Power has since released original music and remixes on a wide range of labels including Hivern Discs, Throne of Blood, Voyuerhythym, Ene Japan, and Correspondant, the home of his self-titled debut album.

o+o Championed by connaisseurs such as Tim Sweeney and John Talabot, and profiled early by media including Mixmag and The Ransom Note, his sphere of influence is on course to continue its expansion over the coming months, perhaps finally breaking through to the enigma that is Man Power.

https://www.facebook.com/Correspondant.records

https://twitter.com/Correspondantfm

https://www.facebook.com/man.power.79230