Bullion

After decades of droll cartoonish samples, it's getting harder and harder to express humour through electronic music. Not that Bullion sets out to be a laugh riot, but You Drive Me To Plastic dispels the muso-seriousness that globetrotting electronica is especially prone to. From the brief mangled bits of Jon Hassell in (ahem) "Slight Jig In the Sky" and Laurie Anderson ("Too Right") to dysentery-afflicted tropical horns in many places, Bullion cooks up tasty early '80s techno-boogie, à la Level 42, but with far less upwardly mobile posturing. Extending the African comparisons, there are more than a few synth-laden African records of the mid-'80s to which this owes a great debt ― the 6/8 Linn drum groove of "Spirit Mighty" is a case in point. But You Drive Me To Plastic is on the safe side of reverential versus derivative. These kinds of exercises usually fall flat, due to the producer being too preoccupied with clever references, but the beats are always pumping on this one, albeit at a medium pace.