Jesse “10:40” Fahnestock`s Transition Theory is certainly a trip. The 11 tracks segue, in places seamlessly, together in an aural adventure, with a beginning, middle, and end. It starts with loose percussion, backwards guitar, and the sound of a harp or a zither. Suggesting a modal, spiritual jazz, and initiating the air of a psychedelic ceremony, to the point where you’re waiting for an interjection, instructions, from Timothy Leary on how to enter the next bardo.

When drums first appear, they’re sluggish, chugging, stoned, but the tone is most definitely uplifting. Then snares commence smashing, and the music marches tougher, in a manner that should move the gnostic masses, the faithful, at A Love From Outer Space. The analogue machines in call and response with one another constructing some novo new beat. There are arpeggios a-go-go, and terrific blasts of sub-bass, amid Euro techno rave shapes. Someone sighs, somewhere between gospel and sexy secular rapture. The hardware singing, and bringing a bit of digidub flavour. Shaking foundations as an old disco sample spins around. 

Regime Shift Dub is a slo-mo Orb-like journey into inner / outer space. Progressive, proggy, druggy, caught in wave after wave of a peak. A rush. Reproducing that feeling of being completely mind fogged, fucked up, but only a breath away from a new clarity. In debt to dubby IDM gear from the mid-90s, the tracks take their time to build and develop. The presence of subliminal occult whispers indicate that Chris & Cosey are also an influence.  

At The Turning Of The Tide is a highlight. A song, a duet, where a sea of bleeps surrounds an anguished protagonist and the purring object of his desires. The Mountain is a chilly, chiming calm. Floating, as high as a kite, out in the firmament with Primal Scream’s Inner Flight and Shine Like Stars. For a moment it’s Spacemen 3 chasing a red balloon, before revving back up again and driving off into the distance with the deliciously dark, emotive electro of Mantis. 

10:40’s Transition Theory is released on February 15th.