*** Plastikman

CONSUMED

(Novamute)

DJ Richie Hawtin's latest release as Plastikman, Consumed, marks the end of a four-year period of artistic digression during which he released a series of 12-inches under the names FUSE, Circuit Breaker, and Concept and developed other performers on his Plus 8 and Novamute labels. The CD packaging is simple: matte-black cardboard cut to reveal a subtle violet rectangle. Like Hawtin's music, it is inspired by the work of British minimalist sculptor Anish Kapoor and American painter Mark Rothko, both in its austerity and in its subtle allusion to the existence of a window inward. With its stoic synthetic bleeps and spare sequenced beats, Consumed is engineered with the headphone listener in mind. The tracks are repetitive, with changes signaled by slight variations in tones and textures. "Contain" and "Consume" match crisp, down-tempo beats with atmospheric loops. The BPMs begin to escalate on "Passage" and "Convulse," but even at its most manic, Consumed is a reaction against the chunky-beat complexity that has obsessed many of Hawtin's techno contemporaries.

-- Doug MacDonald