Elektrostaub – Reliance (Album – Alfa Matrix)
Genre/Influences: Electro-Pop, Future-Pop.
Format: Digital, CD.
Background/Info: Four years after the debut-album “Birthday And Death” released on Echozone, Patrick Knoch unleashes his second full length featuring an impressive list of guest singers. “Reliance” was preceded by two singles/EP’s, which especially in Germany became pretty successful.
Content: Patrick Knock had some good company with Patrik Hansson (Vanguard, Uncreated), Henrik Iversen (Namnambulu), !Distain duo, René Anke (Logic & Olivia), Stefan Netschio (Beborn Beton), Jan Dieckmann (Norderney), Alex Rush (Unity One), Claudia Uhle (X-Perience), Damasius Venys (Mondträume, Mental Exile), Alex Nórdika (Nórdika) and Darrin Huss (Psyche). Sound-wise Elektrostaub brings a perfect mix of electro-Pop driven and somewhat harder Future-Pop inspired songs. The different singers inject some extra diversity to the work.
The album features previously released singles “Wake Up” and “We Are Dreamers”. There’s only one single song featuring female vocals. !Distain –being good-old friends of Patrick Knock, contributed to 3 songs, one of them featuring French sung lyrics.
+ + + : First of all we have to salute the contribution of some real great and talented singers like Darren Huss, Henrik Iversen and Stefan Netschio, but also brilliant singers from the ‘latest’ generation like Damasius Venys, Patrik Hansson and Claudia Uhle. The single female vocalist injects a heavenly touch to the album. Several songs sound like they were conceived to make people dance and get happy. I also enjoyed the somewhat harder Future-Pop driven cuts and I especially recommend “Futurism” featuring Norderney, which will appeal to VNV Nation fans. “We Are Dreamers” featuring Patrik Hansson remains a great piece of music for its boosting Electro-Pop. There’s also a cool ‘female’ version featuring Claudia Uhle who’s definitely a great singer. Last, but not least I also recommend listening to “Dust” featuring Damasius Venys who’s according to me one of the most charismatic and sexy voices of the scene.
– – – : I expected a bit more from the songs featuring !Distain –an established Electro-Pop formation I’ve always liked. It’s also a pity there’s only one single female singer featured.
Conclusion: Elektrostaub has achieved an ambitious, but accomplished album, which sounds like the perfect crossover between Electro- and Future-Pop.
Best songs: “Futurism feat. Norderney”, “We Are Dreamers featuring Patrik Vanguard”, “We Are Dreamers featuring Claudia Uhle”, “Dust featuring Damasius Venys”, “Save Me featuring René Anke”, “Loneliness featuring !Distain”.
Rate: 8.
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