Genre/Influences: Electro, trance, techno-body.
Format: Digital, CD.
Background/Info: Juan Espinosa took a break after the album “Graveyard Empires” (2016) released on Infacted Recordings. The American artist focused on a few side-projects, but finally got back to Cellmod. His previous albums featured guest singers while “The dissident” is an instrumental work featuring nine songs and the first self-released opus.
Content: Cellmod injected a serious energetic boost to its global production. “The Dissident” is a powerful production composed by a true sound architect. Espinosa is mixing different electro influences resulting in a dynamic production. Solid bass lines and filtered sequences have been merged with hard-beating rhythms and spoken samplings. The samplings are important to understand the hidden message of the artist and the vision upon society and the US.
The work also features two songs that were previously digitally released and now remastered. There also is a remix by Giant Masters On The Horizon.
+ + + : This album is driven by great bass lines and devastating sound treatments. Juan Espinosa can be easily considered as a visionary artist trying to inject powerful ideas into the established electro-underground genre. His work is well-crafted, danceable and powerful. The remastered version of “The Machine” is a great piece of music with elevating trance passages. The other remastered song (cf. “Praying Mantis” is another attention grabber driven by a furious bass line.
– – – : The spoken samplings are adding a little bonus, but some real vocals would be a real plus.
Conclusion: “The Dissident” is an album with a real potential, but maybe missing a few elements, and especially a singer, to get it totally accomplished.
Best songs: “The Machine – 2019 Remaster”, “Inevitable”, “Praying Mantis – 2019 Remaster”, “Ransacked”.
Rate: (7).
