With previous singles on the Siesta, Yoshitoshi and Doubledown imprints regular features in record boxes of house and techno DJs alike, the US West Coast duo’s debut long-player has been an eagerly awaited proposition.
That Soma Records are responsible for its release seems appropriate - Eric ‘Hipp-e’ Gavalviz and Brian ‘Halo’ Varga have both become regular fixtures at the Glasgow-based label’s monthly ‘Pressure’ night, where their trademark deep, dub-flecked house sets have gained support among regulars of the house-meets-techno showcase.
However, with ‘Environments’, the duo have left the dance-floor behind, producing instead a collection of after-hours deep house, sprinkled with dub and funk.
Recruiting Australian musical collective Twenty Four Seven has surely played its part, their input on the laid-back, jazz-funk of ‘Environments’, particularly evident. More familiar four-four beats are to be found on ‘Sol Searchin’ - moody tech-house and the album track bearing closest resemblance to previous H-Foundation productions.
Elsewhere, there’s the tribal sounding, Murk-like vocal of ‘Tonight’, the straightforward, deep house of ‘Nature’ and ‘Doo Ya!’, not to mention recent single, ‘New Funk Theory’, which highlights the pair’s ability to turn out some serious, funk-fried disco. Meanwhile, they drop the tempo and add a dose of jazz and dub to proceedings on ‘Scenario’, ‘Broken Arrow’, ‘So Fine’ and ‘Passage of Time’.
Not a bad debut all in all, but the album’s jazz elements are a little cosmetic and the experimental, ‘Slaying The Dragon’ feels tacked on, inevitably making parts of ‘Environments’ seem token and just-for-the-sake-of-it.
Reviewed by Colin Chapman
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