Daniel Avery: Ultra Truth album review — velocity matched with contemplation

Daniel Avery made his breakthrough with the galvanic techno of his 2013 album Drone Logic, a calling card that opened the doors of clubland to the London-based DJ. He took his foot off the accelerator for his most recent album, last year’s Together in Static, whose ambient, introspective feel coincided with dance music’s enforced lay-off during lockdowns.

A more Pavlovian producer would respond to the reopening of clubs with a redoubled battery of the beats originally unleashed on Drone Logic. But Avery is more thoughtful than that. Rather than turn the clock back, his new album Ultra Truth seeks to synthesise the twin poles of his music-making. Velocity is matched with contemplation, noise emerges out of calm. It has a twinned sense of vigour and space, a reminder that breathing is a muscular process.

“New Faith” gets the album under way with a simple piano melody with so much echo and distortion applied that it becomes uncomfortably abrasive. “Ultra Truth” has a warm, chunky beat and plaintive electronic melody. “Wall of Sleep” combines an insistently pressing drum-and-bass routine with gauzy synthesiser drones and a dreamlike vocal by Australian singer Haai buried in the mix.

Avery handles the musical extremes with care rather than a cartoonish notion of contrast. In “Near Perfect”, an electronic drone builds until it begins to seem claustrophobic while the track’s heavy beat offers a counterintuitive release. A smeary wave of sonic distortion engulfs us in “Overflowing with Escape”, testament to Avery’s love of My Bloody Valentine. The mixing of genres and textures has a tutelary spirit: his mentor was Andrew Weatherall, the great maverick of UK electronic music. Tribute is paid to him with “Lone Swordsman”, made on the day that Avery learned of Weatherall’s death in 2020. With Ultra Truth, the torch is passed on.

★★★★☆

‘Ultra Truth’ is released by Phantasy Sound