Torii MacAdams insists on trial by combat
The rapid ascendance of electronic music, from the sound of subcultures to arena-cramming, Billboard-busting tour de fucking force, is remarkable. Dance music in the United States has become as pluralistic as our barely functioning country, running the gamut from analog, jackin’ house to the stupidly labeled “EDM,” the official music of dudes in neon-colored tank tops. Enter Jim-E Stack, a 22-year old producer whose debut album Tell Me I Belong is set to be released by Innovative Leisure. Despite his relative youth, Stack’s music is well-traveled: he had an opaque affiliation with Mad Decent that appears to have ceased, an EP on defunct label Good Years, another on Body High, and finally the upcoming LP on Innovative Leisure. Stack’s sound is as varied as the labels he’s worked with; Tell Me I Belong is illustrative of a young musician influenced by the 21st century’s wildly variable trends and soundscapes.
Stack, like every sentient human with feelings, is an avowed Burial fan. For many producers, American and foreign alike, Burial is an un-eclipsable horizon, the Platonic realization of dance music’s ability to be heavy and emotive. On “Reassuring,” a track bearing clear Burial influence, Stack struggles to build momentum through the first half of the song. Stack has a gift for percussion; when “Reassuring” becomes percussive roughly two minutes in is when the song strikes closest to the crepuscular oranges and purples toward which it aims.
Tell Me I Belong sometimes labors with the emotional heft Stack intended to impart– “Without” in particular is a dud– but the album doesn’t lack for success in this regard. Many of Stack’s contemporaries make similar sounding music in overeager attempts at commercial viability, but he does well to show emotional depth and self-restraint. “Is It Me” uses a vocal sample in a way that doesn’t feel too on the nose; it’s pitched up and down, and possibly rewound, creating a rhythmic line that interplays with the percussion nicely. “Somewheres” and “Below” aren’t overly ambitious, but pleasant, warm, and don’t strain reaching for ease of acceptance.
When Stack beings swimming in the deep end of American music is when Tell Me I Belong becomes most fun. Instead of turning to mainstream sources of hardness (brostep, “trap-house”*) Stack takes inspiration from Black Americans’ indelible contribution to the electronic canon, particularly those from New York/New Jersey and Detroit. Other skilled (and widely blogged about) musicians are treading these paths at present, but that’s because these paths are organic, powerful sources of inspiration. “Run” and “Out of Mind” are the two truly standout cuts from Tell Me I Belong, and feel like the A and B sides of the same 12”. “Run” is a militant track that sounds like an updated “The Ha Dance,” Masters At Work’s 1991 house classic **. On “Out of Mind,” Stack unleashes a barebones techno beat and what sounds like an Eazy-E sample, which transforms into something approaching Jersey club music.
I wouldn’t go so far as to call Stack “innovative,” but he is able to be placed side by side with a young generation of richly talented American producers. Tell Me I Belong shows great promise in its balancing act of cerebral and bodily tunes for DJs and non-DJs alike.
*Vomit.
**He’s not the first to take inspiration from “The Ha Dance.” In an interview with the Red Bull Music Academy, ballroom star Mike Q claims “Just about all of the tracks I’ve made are ‘Ha’s’, maybe 90% of them.
