It was while employed by Berlin record shop, Hard Wax, that René Lowe had his first encounter with the mixing desk. One half of Scion, he worked in its basement studio alongside Mark Ernestus and Moritz von Oswald, better known as reclusive but revered production duo, Basic Channel, his relationship with the pair leading to the 1995 debut, ‘Lyot’, under the Vainquer guise, on their BC label.
Later that year, René pooled his studio gear with fellow Hardwax employee Peter Kushnereit and Scion was born, with first single ‘Emerge’, a shimmering collision between dub and techno, marking the first release of BC sister label, Chain Reaction. Consecutive years of compulsory civil service halted the pair’s music making and though they’ve toured Europe and the U.S as a live act, the pair are yet to release any new material.
In the meantime, ‘Scion: Arrange and Process...’ showcases some of their production skills. Using ‘Live Audio’ software, the pair have pillaged the Basic Channel catalogue, adopting a ‘pick and mix’ philosophy to take their favourite elements and create something of their own in the process. For those of you unaware (that included myself until some research), ‘Live Audio’ gives musicians the “…ability to take a beat or a loop, drop it into a sequencing environment and watch it automatically beat match to the chosen beats per minute - like magic - in real time".*
The result is an intricate, hour-long mix, which includes label highlights such as Detroit-influenced ‘Infinition’, the dirty dub-scape of ‘Octaedre’ and ‘Phylyps Track’s tribal-stomp, merged and layered over samples from tracks by Radiance, Cyrus, Rhythm and Sound, many of which have been previously unavailable on CD.
For those who missed out on their releases first time around and are curious about the fanaticism surrounding Basic Channel, 'Arrange and Process...' provides a great overview of their highly influential sound.
*http://www.apple.com/hotnews/articles/2002/05/live15/
www.tresor-berlin.de
Reviewed
by Colin Chapman
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