Unreasonable Behaviour

12/07/2000 8:00 PM, Yahoo! Music
Ken Micallef

Innovative French DJ Laurent Garnier has been at the techno forefront for so long, he practically seems like an old git. But the glimmering music of Unreasonable Behaviour is anything but old fashioned. Not as four-to-floor techno-bound as his previous releases, the album finds him creating a comfort zone through a variety of sounds.

Some have cited UR as Garnier's Detroit album, or his jazz techno effort. But with techno's roots in the '70s, and trance, house, and drum 'n' bass pushing the future envelope, Garnier is simply taking stock and moving beyond the genre's sometimes stifling barriers. An artist this gifted uses his skills to make music, not cling to style. While the familiar 808s and 909s of techno are rife on Unreasonable Behaviour, the music covers breakbeat, jazz, techno, beat noir, and even hints at Brazilian rhythms.

Garnier emits a keen sense of humor, witnessed in the odd cat meow loops of the Numanesque "Forgotten Thoughts"; or the playful farts, belches, and slaps of "Cycles D'Oppositions, which recalls Aphex Twin drowning in a vat of honey. Whether working the jazzy urban sprawl of "The Man With The Red Face" or creating ambient noir 'n' beats with "Communications From The Lab," Garnier bends techno into grand designs without ever losing the plot. The closing "Last Tribute From The 20th Century" classifies as downtempo techno--a moody, buzzing web of tranquility.

Are these subliminal beat moods for moderns or just the sweet sounds of techno romance? Aren't the French the original lovers of the world anyway? That's not unreasonable. Rating 90 Ken Micallef