- Since his last record as Taraval, Ryan Smith has kept busy with some unusual collaborative projects. The Canadian's solo alias, however, sticks to a simple brief: to make characterful dance music for big rooms. Like the second of his two records for Four Tet's Text, No Coast veers from the disco-house flavours of Smith's early tracks towards a tougher and often darker techno sound. The most colour we get comes in "Stan's Loon," where melodic flurries and glistening chords spice up a buoyant circa-120 BPM groove. Wild clap barrages don't enter until the last 90 seconds or so, the arrangement equivalent of getting two thirds through your jog and realising you've barely broken a sweat.
But mostly the mood is gloomier. On "No Coast" a chilly klaxon bleep brings the dystopian drama, around which Smith sneaks in quietly funky percussion. The other tracks splay arps and chord stabs polyrhythmically across the groove—a standard big-room techno technique, only Smith's synths warp and wobble with an unusual gooey softness. "Kima Jima"'s lead line is furtive, scuttling down the piano roll as if fleeing the scene of a crime, before gentler kosmische colouring soothes it. "Topaz's Way" lacks this calming element. It's the EP's straightest—and most banging—track, but it still has a hint of the oddball flair that marks Smith out.
TracklistA1 No Coast
A2 Stan's Loon
B1 Kima Jima
B2 Topaz's Way