December 16–23, 1999

disc quicks|rock/pop

Various Artists

Flav-O-Pac: Memeograph 1

(Soundlab Records)

For the last four years, the Soundlab entourage of DJs, musicians, MCs, homemade machines and visual artists has been appearing randomly and unexpectedly in urban underground venues, delivering gatherings unlike any other. The artists create illbient sounds while the visual crews improvise with light, video and film. "Illbient" — a combination of hip-hop beats and scratches, drum ’n’ bass, jazz, tribal, ambient and random city noises — can be taken as an attack or a challenge on your psyche. Listening can be like having a bad trip, though this shouldn’t dissuade you. Illbient artists tend to be based in the realism and vibes (regardless of negative and positive aspects) of urban culture and city life. As the liner notes state, "[Soundlab] was always an evening in the electrotectural now — a laboratory atmosphere in bpm and tribal affiliation." Flav-O-Pac: Memeograph 1 is a continuous 20-track mix CD of works recorded during Soundlab gatherings. The live fragments are mixed by Soundlab co-conspirators, Singe & Verb, and feature tracks by DJ Spooky, Lloop, BassLineMassive, DJ Wally, DJ Soulslinger, Blank States, Koosiljah and others. Soundlab played three years ago at the Philly Fringe, and this CD is a perfect representation of what you might experience at a Soundlab gathering — and parallels the threshold and impact (whether damaging or enriching) that a city can have on one’s intellect and state of being.

—Sean O’Neal