REVIEWS
D-Styles
Phantazmagorea
(Beat Junkie Sound)
Shock music is lame -- artists who front like they are crazy just make me
laugh. There's no worse gimmick than appealing to the lowest common
denominator of human perversion just to sell a record. Exceptions to the
rule do exist, however. Eventually the dementia of modern society will
spawn an artist who can put forth disturbing imagery and open your world
to a whole new realm of fucked up perception. D-Styles is one of those
people, and Phantazmagorea is his sadistic masterpiece. What makes this
record even more awe-inspiring is that D-Styles does not say one word on
the album, and except for a very miniscule amount of sound, all the
music and vocals contained in this release were sampled, scratched and
tweaked off of a turntable. This is scratch music in its purest form and
is changing the game, retiring new jacks and sending veteran
turntablists back to the lab to figure out what the fuck happened.
-- Elias Perez, Synthesis.net
While there is no animated movie to accompany it, there might as well
be, as D-Styles' Phantazmagorea is the best turntablist album since DJ
Q-Bert's Wave Twisters, if not one that surpasses it. But for this
writer, "all that scratchin' is making me itch," and in a bad way.
That's right, I'm not a frequent visitor to Scratchappyland, and while
the skill of the turntablist is respected, after ten minutes of three
guys scratching in unison, it gets a little tiring. Naturally, I
wouldn't even touch this album, but after overhearing it a few times, I
had to take a deeper listen -- this actually sounded really dope.
The theme that runs concurrent throughout the entire album is like
"Faces of Death" on wax, as D-Styles incorporates a montage of different
samples from horror movies, sensational serial killer documentaries,
anti-drug videos, and the nightly news. But in all of its darkness,
there is a certain comedy to it that makes it entertaining, as it's more
Dr. Octagon than Necro. For instance, "Won't You Be My Neighbor"
exhibits D-Styles as the "regular sort of guy, who liked hamburgers and
chocolate ice cream," as he manipulates horrific pianos with turntablist
boom-bap among a psychosis of samples. Or "Cliffords Mustache," which
portrays him as the guy across the street with "cocaine on his mustache"
who's "into wife swapping and sex parties," again manipulating edgy
pianos and cutting up cries of fear. Sounds nasty on paper, but dope on
wax.
However, towards the end, D-Styles strays off course a little with
"Flowtation Device," which still searches for an answer to the tired old
question, "what is a DJ if he can't scratch," for the most part he
sticks to the script. But the thing that makes this album a true
accomplishment is that it trends the line between technique and style.
So many times we've heard DJs try and make records that show off their
skill, but musically sounds like a lot of noise. But D-Styles has done
the impossible, seamlessly bringing technique and style together. Not
only does this album play like one long piece of music, but listen to
tracks like "John Wayne On Acid," "The Murder Faktory," or the posse cut
"Felonious Funk" (feat. DJ Babu, Q-Bert & Melo-D), and then ask yourself
if this sounds like a bunch of endless scratching. In the liner notes,
D-Styles writes "If at times you happen to forget that I created these
songs solely from scratching, then I've succeeded." Indeed he has.
-- D.T. Swinga, HipHopSite.com
In an age when albums by hip-hop DJs seem to downplay turntablist
techniques in favor of a mash-up mixtape aesthetic, D-Styles takes a
bold dive into uncharted waters with his debut album, Phantazmagorea.
The former Invisibl Skratch Pikl (and current Beat Junkie) cultivates a
dark, esoteric vibe with both his meticulous method of song construction
and his twisted choice of sampling material.
Ditching the usual loops and programmed beats, D-Styles crafts his songs
by multitracking manipulated drum sounds, basslines, melodic fragments,
and vocal snippets, literally building his music from scratch. While
this process is a common mode of composition and live performance for
turntablist crews, Phantazmagorea marks the first time the approach has
been used for an entire album.
This method might sound like a recipe for a masturbatory disaster, but
D-Styles shows uncommon restraint. Save for the posse cut "Felonious
Funk," featuring DJs Melo-D, Babu, and Q-Bert, and a high-octane duel
with Q-Bert on "Clifford's Mustache," D-Styles keeps the scratch soloing
to a bare minimum. Instead he focuses his vinyl manipulation on rhythmic
counterpoint, song structure, and the introduction of disturbed sound
bites.
When the layered tunes work, as on "The Murder Faktory" and "Terror in
Dub," the combination of digital dexterity and dark imagination makes
for compelling listening. Unfortunately D-Styles's perverse
"horrorphonic" fixation and dogmatic scratch-based approach effectively
pigeonhole Phantazmagorea. The producer's horror-film samples and
endless arsenal of fucked-up spoken-word tidbits -- Charles Manson
speaking in tongues, Hervé Villechaize lamenting life on Fantasy Island,
Henry Rollins waxing violent, and others exploring child molestation,
prostitution, Satan, and the apocalypse -- beat the album's perpetually
ominous atmosphere into the ground. More important, the scratch patterns
and uniform tempos lock the songs into a narrow sound template.
Phantazmagorea is impressive in technical terms, but listeners outside
of hard-core turntable circles may find D-Styles's excursions difficult
to digest. -- Dave Pehling, SF Weekly
"It's the most beautiful ugly sound in the world." The opening lines of
Phantazmagorea sum up this record all at once. Now that most skratch DJs
have transformed into club DJs or retreated back to the bedroom, it's
very appropriate that the most anticipated and perhaps most important
skratch composition comes to the surface. What have we learned in the
last few years? Skratch DJs don't have the charisma (sans a few) or mass
appeal to carry a movement. It's almost better off this way, then you
don't have to deal with message boards full of new jaxs and point to
provers, and you can truly appreciate albums like this without thinking
about if that was a triple click orbit smoothie with protein blast you
just heard. Isn't the skratch world a better place now? Anyway, where as
Wave Twisters was the introduction, this is the second phase, the
skratch drumming more hidden, and the ear more used to turntablist
composition. D takes his dark style further into depths unheard of. Go
to an outer Times Square video stores, ask for one of the videos behind
the counter and you might find a hardcore equivalent, but as far as
music goes, this is its own genre. I'm not even into horror, but the
musicianship cuts straight into you. When we play this at the store,
nobody can concentrate on anything. Pointing out audio samples really
won't do too much good here, cause tracks convulse and contract; I'm not
really doing the best job in actually describing this record -- it's quite
difficult. Just buy it, burn it, trade it, tape it, or stab babies in
the chest. We like it. 19 tracks including interludes. -- Turntable Lab
A slept on turntablist album. Whilst Q-Bert's Wave Twisters is still
receiving press, Wax Fondler/D-Styles Phantazmagorea, seems to be getting
no love. The album would be best described as a morbid scratch bomb
featuring lots of movie samples, weird sounds, spoken word, funky
scratching, and tons of other shit to keep warped minds occupied.
Fantastic artwork and packaging in a great heavy gatefold. Featured
guests include Q-Bert, Melo-D and Xtrakd. My favorite track would have
to be "John Wayne On Acid." Phantazmagorea is like the Bitches Brew of
the turntablism genre. -- SoulStrut.com
Scratch in its purest form from Mr. Hotsauce himself. The insanity you'd
hope for with the quality you'd expect. -- ADDreviews.com
IN FRENCH: D-Styles, Dj de la bay area d'origine philippine, ancien membre des
Insivibl Skratch Piklz et désormais affilié aux crew beats jukies, a
participé durant toute sa carrière à de nombreux battles qui l'a opposé
aux meilleurs Djs du pays ce qui lui a permis de faire de nombreuses
rencontres dans le métier (notamment Q-Bert et Shortkut), autant dire
qu'il n'a rien d'un novice dans le domaine. Après de multiples
collaborations et quelques scratch tapes, son premier album long format,
produit et réalisé entièrement par ses soins, porte le nom étrange de
Phantazmagorea.
Le premier titre assez paradoxal: "Beautiful Ugly Sound" nous annonce
tout de suite la couleur, rythmé par un beat strident et traumatisant,
les scratchs fusent de tous les côtés, ce premier ticket pour un voyage
au plus profond de l'enfer est d'ores et déjà une tuerie imprégné d'une
atmosphère lugubre qui va se perpétuer jusqu'à la dernière note ou
plutôt le dernier scratch de l'album. D-Styles est obnubilé par le
meurtre et le corps humain, une petite visite sur son site
www.djdstyles.com s'impose d'ailleurs pour comprendre l'esprit torturé
du bonhomme. C'est cette obsession pour le macabre que D-Styles
retranscrit dans sa musique et dans le cas présent sur Phantazmagorea
qui dans son ensemble véhicule des visions d'horreurs successives, une
vraie introspection dans le cerveau du DJ. Le scratch est l'élément
central de Phantazmagorea, tout au long du LP, D-Styles l'utilise
d'ailleurs à merveille comme un instrument pour disséquer et triturer
ses beats et cela pour notre plus grand plaisir.
Cet album s'entame donc comme un voyage sinueux à travers un univers
mortuaire matérialisé par un vrai festival sonore. Tous les styles
musicaux sont assemblés avec dextérité tel un immense patchwork comme
sur "The Murder Factory" où D-Styles pose ses scratchs sur des
claquements de mains qui font office de beat, avec une voix de reggae
man qui intervient ponctuellement, tout cela agrémenté de petits
dialogues tirés de films d'épouvante bref il faut l'écouter pour le
croire ! Les bons morceaux se succèdent sans temps morts, comme avec un
"Fuck You Pacman" et ses samples de jeu vidéo mêlés à cette sonnerie
angoissante perpétuelle que D-Styles dynamise par ses scratchs, la
deuxième partie du morceau nous met d'ailleurs littéralement sur le cul
en nous offrant une leçon de turnbalism. On pourrait également citer
"John Wayne On Acid" (belle preuve d'imagination pour le titre des
morceaux !) qui s'illustre comme une ballade inquiétante où encore une
fois D-Styles nous fout une véritable claque, petite explication : les
scratchs sont en symbiose parfaite avec le beat, nous donnant
l'impression sur certaines phases qu'il est entrain de jouer de la
guitare électrique: Impressionnant. D-Styles c'est également faire
danser les foules notamment sur "Flowtation Device" où les beats aux
sonorités électronique associés aux performances du Dj philippin
constituent un réel plaisir auditif, les allergiques au turnbalism
déjanté sont prévenus.
Phantazmagorea après son écoute complète n'est pas sans rappeler
Little Johnny From The Hospital de Company Flow dans la forme (en bien sur
beaucoup plus axé turnbalism) tant le Dj californien semble mettre dans
chaque morceau toute la haine et la brutalité qu'il ressent. A L'instar
des meilleurs albums hiphop instrumentaux, Phantazmagorea nous fait
oublier que nous sommes entrain d'écouter du hiphop en s'orchestrant
comme une bande originale démente d'un film d'horreur. Un album violent,
sadique ponctué d'humour comme on aimerait en voir plus souvent, comme
quoi la musique peut être beaucoup plus significative que des mots qui
plus est quand un véritable génie est derrière les platines...
-- HipHopCore.net