Outland

Album review

Having moved beyond the colorful hybrids of dubstep, juke, and jungle that made up his discography until 2015, Alan Myson's work as Ital Tek since 2016's Hollowed has been much darker and more isolated, filled with cinematic suspense and immaculate sound design. 2020 full-length Outland is yet more reflective than the producer's previous two albums, composed after the birth of his first child, as well as his relocation from the city of Brighton, England, to a more secluded locale. He hasn't returned to making club music, but Outland is a bit more rhythmic and bass-heavy than his previous two albums. There's a much sharper bite to the way he uses distortion here, and the tracks with beats sound monstrous. "Deadhead" is a big, scaly beast prowling through the dystopian wreckage, and "Bladed Terrain" is a similar sort of booming bass mutation with an elevated sense of paranoia. "Diamond Child" has a slower, more measured pulse but gradually becomes washed out with hazy, psychedelic textures that sound like fuzz-drenched flutes. "Leaving the Grid" is one last look back at the civilized world before turning to a more privatized space, with flares of distortion resembling momentary flashes of memories. The stuttering beats and twinkling, spiraling melodies of "Endless" feel like a nervous heartbeat and sense of uneasiness as one prepares for a new stage of life, and the album's final track, a piece of haunted cyber-trap called "Oblivion Theme," is at once a bittersweet goodbye and a new beginning.

© Paul Simpson /TiVo