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Ventla's Smuggled is the number one micro pop album the year, in my opinion. With the longest track topping out at a minute and nine seconds, it's a hardcore songwriting approach to ear candy that emphasizes excerpts of abbreviations of introductions to fully realized fragments. It's 28 tracks and a thousand moments, purring, squelching, and tinkling past your head like a commercial for a good idea you haven't had yet. Gripping stuff, all around. Put it on and let it ride.
Orange Milk continues to be one of my favourite labels in the entire world. Their recent 4-tape batch is all very good, but Ventla's Smuggled is in a league of its own. This sucker is straight-up weird. With 28 songs, only one of which clocks in over a minute, there are a ton of different ideas presented here. Think funked-out basslines, vocoder, shiny synth leads, random samples, Japanese vocals, and then some, yet nothing seems out of place. My friend Lars described this as Dilla meets J-Pop, and that’s not too far off. Constructing an entirely new sound world, Ventla is a revelation.
Article reposted on 2013-12-02 because Smuggled is ranked Fact Magazine's ninth best cassette release of 2013.