Various – Imaginary Landscapes

I'm not very familiar with Force Inc’s long-since defunct (and short-lived) house subsidiary Intense Recordings, and "Imaginary Landscapes" is the only release in its catalogue that resides in my collection. This compilation mostly contains material produced by DJ Tonka and Ian Pooley (when they were still in their teens and busy on the rave circuit with their Space Cube project), plus Jörg "Modernist" Burger. The kind of house music on offer here is of the extremely naïve and unrefined variety; pianos a-plenty, cheesy hooks, cliched basslines and keyboard stabs, indiscriminate use of vocal samples and an altogether simplistic and somewhat goofy approach which is so early 90's it hurts, nowhere near the best and most timeless house of this period. (An example of the latter would be Space Cube's exquisite "Dolphins" from 1992). It is, for the most part, hopelessly antiquated and lightweight. But a lot of fun. I dare you to listen to this music and remain unaffected by its carefree optimism and charming, sometimes overenthusiastic innocence. Compared to today's streamlined, politically correct dance music, it certainly falls flat in the technical department – but with music like this, picking holes in the production is just a meaningless exercise. These tracks document an era, and do it brilliantly – in fact, they paint a much more accurate picture of this period than the revered classics that have stood the test of time. (Thomas Heckmann's lush and still relevant ambient techno classic "Parnophelia" actually feels a bit out of place here). I'm not on a mission to seek out more records on this label – after all, an hour of this music will suffice – but this CD isn't leaving my house.

As a side note, the mega pretentious title of this thing (also the name of a series of John Cage compositions) must have been label owner Achim Szepanski's idea; I can't think of anyone else who could possibly consider "Imaginary Landscapes" an apt tag for this collection of light-hearted party tracks. Pure genius.