While regularly hosting off-the-hook parties, the Good Block guys, since first gaining recognition in 2017, have limited their releases to just a handful of productions, remixes and edits. The duo, however, have clearly been busy in the studio, ’cos they’re now sharing their debut LP, titled Window. 

If you jump over to the Good Block Bandcamp page, you’ll learn that the album was significantly delayed due to the lacquers getting lost – twice – but the chaps have also been taking their time honing a sound and perfecting their chops. All of the tracks and arrangements demonstrate a level of musicality often absent from “leftfield dance” / “Balearic” gear. Nothing is simply building a badass beat and looping it. 

In the past when reviewing Good Block’s grooves I’ve referenced people such as Art Of Noise, Colourbox, William Orbit, Ryuichi Sakamoto and Andrew Weatherall (1), and I’m certain that these folks each played a part. For example, accompanied by funky organ flashes, the chunky but not “drug chuggy” – the mood here is never dark – Scatter Dub could be Chakk with Steven Stanley, Sly & Robbie. The Compass Point All-Stars fed through Sheffield’s FON (2).

That said, the boys, though, have moved on to develop something distinctly their own. Drawing on Trevor Horn, ZTT and `80s post-punk electronic pop, paying homage to pioneers, but, above all, relishing experimentation and invention. Machines mimic slapped basses. Robots shred fuzzbox guitars. Vocals are fractured as if through a Fairlight. On the digidub 23 Scatter they’re stitched back together in a sort of snake-charmer’s song. Sine waves are stretched into sitar-like shapes. Keys hit exotic, like zithers and gongs.

Lema’s pattering programmed percussion and sighing panpipe-like synth summon the serenity of an African Savannah. The slow, skanking Coda is a potential future classic. Rocking a little “Jesus On The Payroll” piano, back in the day, 88 / 89, it would have been a Boy’s Own cockney cover-up, alongside the likes of Red Box. Its style perhaps copped from treasured European sides such Alain Delon’s Comme Au Cinema. 

The breakbeat-driven Datura beefs up the BPMs. Arps flickering, fidgeting. Gated synths in its distance. Acid fractals to the fore. The shuffling Sandii, conversely, is the set’s most laidback number. A showcase for some seriously skilful live bass. The 4 fat strings carrying both the funk and the melody. The closing Rain is almost ambient techno. Tightly twisted TB-303 pinpoints shooting like stars through its scattered, echoed, electro rhythm. Rushing, beatless toward a final flute-like fanfare, and further extending the pair’s palette of sonic possibilities. 

NOTES

(1) I’m no doubt biased but the spirit of Weatherall, in particular, seems to loom large. 23 Scatter sounds like something from one of his closing 5 / 6AM sets, circa 1990, at somewhere like Dingwalls / Gosh. The gated synths in Datura’s distance are an echo of Weatherall and Nicolson’s remix of Love Corporation’s Give Me Some Love. Rain recalls Sabres Of Paradise’s more stoned, atmospheric, ambient percolations – such as Chapel Street Market – while the flute finale can’t help but bring to mind Smokebelch. 

(2) The FON Studios acronym stands for “Fuck Off Nazis.”

Good Block’s wonderful Window can be ordered directly from Bandcamp.