M.I.A.

Combining a bare, melancholic, occasionally funk-ified 4/4 beat with subtle vocal samples, minimal techno producer M.I.A. (aka Michaela Golbeny) gets her groove on in Bittersuss. While the sound is clean, deep and bubbly, unfortunately Bittersuss’s tracks start out with much more promise than they deliver. "Wild Pony” is the best example of a fine aquatic loop that goes nowhere, and most others sink into similar cleanly executed monotony. Not that expectations for originality are high or that Bittersuss lacks some merit but this is a good illustration of the fact that no matter how good your sound bank, you can’t just leave an android in the studio and hope for anything particularly interesting to happen. Things do pick-up in the later half of the CD, "Chanteua Mandourelle” being the most uplifting and party appropriate. To its credit, Bittersuss is consistent enough in its drive to warm up the dance floor; however, overall it ends up being simply a smooth but rather uneventful affair.