On his seventh album, DJ Shadow has reined in the collaborations with vocalists and put his compositional nous front and centre. The result feels like a trippy 1980s mixtape with synths and boom-bap drums intersecting elegantly. Though it doesn’t quite have the emotional or commercial viability of 2019’s ‘Our Pathetic Age’, it lands in a pretty handsome sweet spot, with an awe inspiring degree of production versatility.
There are some magical moments as the Los Angeles turntablist and producer goes deep into his bag of tricks. Time and Space is a synth-hop odyssey, somewhere between Jan Hammer’s Miami Vice soundtrack and a Brooklyn sound happening. It trips and stumbles and manages to stay on its feet, navigating a past vision of what the future looks like.
Elsewhere, Fleeting Youth (An Audible Life) opens with sombre, watery keys and slowly develops into an immersive space laser soundscape.
This is thoughtful, patient music making that kicks at the outer edges of hip-hop compositional norms.
It would have been called avant garde 30 years ago — now it’ll get smacked with that pejorative oar of being soundtracky. So often in DJ Shadow’s particular genre of trip-hop, the challenge is that tracks can feel empty without a vocalist to keep them ticking over.
Witches Vs. Warlocks is one such moment — it could have done with a rapper breaking things up. Reflecting Pool is another, though it sounds more like ‘Kid A’-era Radiohead. Would a Thom Yorke vocal elevate the work here? Almost certainly.
But let’s not to be too dismissive. ‘Action Adventure’ is a concept album that lives in sounds, ideas, motifs. It is a terrific soundtrack for creative ideation, and if Brian Eno has taught us anything, it’s that ambient music can get the listener somewhere that normal songwriting cannot. It just lacks immediacy.
DJ Shadow Upcoming Tour Dates are as follows:
Tue March 19 2024 - BRIGHTON Concorde 2
Wed March 20 2024 - LEEDS Project House
Fri March 22 2024 - MANCHESTER New Century
Sat March 23 2024 - LONDON HERE at Outernet
Sun March 24 2024 - BRISTOL Central Warehouse
Wed March 27 2024 - GLASGOW Barrowlands
Thu March 28 2024 - DUBLIN The Academy
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