The underground rap label Mush made its name with a host of fresh faces, which makes the release of
Neotropic's
White Rabbits an intriguing exception. Otherwise, it's a natural fit,
Riz Maslen's experimental nature matching perfectly to the artist-focused and chance-taking nature of Mush (surely the ESP-Disk of modern beat-based music).
White Rabbits, the fourth album under her best-known moniker, continues and expands upon her previous work, which previously appeared on the Ntone subsidiary of Ninja Tune and ended with an ambitious multimedia experiment titled
La Prochaine Fois. As before,
Maslen is working with other musicians, but here there are fewer collaborations and more instances of
Maslen leading her own group and signalling a solo (for the excellent harmonica player Joff Watkins on "Feelin' Remote" or for her own flute on "Joe Luke"). Touching on ambient dub with the same sure hand she's exhibited throughout her career, she works best on the margins, creating long songs that smack of the tense, haunting interstitials in a film thriller. Her productions have grown yet more organic, more free-form, and more evocative, which makes digesting the record a long process but a rewarding one.