The community potential and the promise of physical liberation that came with dance music spoke loudly to both da Costa and Whitelock, and following the dissolution of Regal Degal, da Costa set up a new life for himself in Los Angeles—a steady relationship, a pet bird, a car —and got down to work with a copy of Ableton. Back in New York, his head spun by DJ Rashad, Whitelock was learning to program, too. They kept their line of communication open, and eventually Whitelock started making the cross-country trek to work and record with his old bandmate. They mined the sound they established with Regal Degal, applying their old band’s heavy atmospherics and melancholy soul to four-on-the-floor rhythm grids and smoothed-out guitar lines, taking production cues from EBM and AOR in equal measure. If Confusing Mix of Nations is a tour of anything, though, it’s not countries so much as psychic spaces.
Each of its ten tracks feels like a postcard from an aesthetic territory worth returning to. Opener “Coo” begins with locked-in grooves reminiscent of Drugdealer (for whom da Costa drums) or Mild High Club, until it suddenly gives itself over to a rhythm that’s been chattering away in the back of the track. As da Costa and Whitelock follow its hints, “Coo” suddenly inverts its priorities and sounds like Miami bass all leaned out for Halloween, then calmly returns to the opening groove, the only proof of the excursion an excess of delay on da Costa’s vocal. “Peter Pan” struts like it’s on its way to meet side two of Sandinista! in its verses, then glows with New Romantic shine in the chorus. The pop hooks on “Good to Know” feel like they could set off a festival crowd, but they’re offset by a strange hollow ache at the song’s center—a weird sadness that makes you feel a little bad for dancing to it.
TRACK LISTING
SIDE A
1. Coo
2. Good To Know
3. Dreamfucking
4. Celluloid
5. Mindboggling
SIDE B
1. Peter Pan
2. Sam
3. Zoo
4. Base
5. Letdown