Blam! Surprise. Faxada’s Cohost hit
my inbox like a fully loaded cement truck smashes into the wall of the bank
it’s robbing in broad daylight. The tracklist plays like a who’s who of Dirty Dozen–esque proportions (obviously
if Dirty Dozen featured a bank job).
There’s the mastermind (“Kirchner’s Girls”), the IT man (“Grenadines, for
Scrapping”), the handsome one (“Throwers”), the muscle (“In Shifts”), the wild
card (“Knobby Russet”), the explosives expert (“Glass Cloak”). I mean, there
are more caricatures of these types of characters that we could pinpoint, but
where’s the fun in that? Here’s the fun in this: know, verily, that Cohost is an amazingly cohesive
experimental/electronic/dance record, and that it is made by a Polish youngster
named Przemek, who is probably younger than your kids (he looks young, I don’t
know how true this is – let’s just say he’s probably never seen the Dirty Dozen). His debut cassette is
filled with wonderful samples and melody, way more detailed than I ever would
have expected. And it’s not just a party – it’s all over the place. It lurches,
it’s subtle, it’s a soundtrack to a bank robbery or smashing up a hotel room.
Maybe Przemek’s gone full rock star and smashed up a hotel room, but instead of
doing it himself, he’s allowed his samples to physically materialize to do it
for him. He’s like the puppet master of samples. There are even some cartoon
samples about honey pots on “Zinc Yellow” – I don’t think they’re from Winnie
the Pooh, but they’re freaky in contrast. I think that’s the point – “Zinc
Yellow” might be the evil center of Cohost,
a direct conduit to Przemek’s brain and data point from which all the chaos
emerges. But again, fun chaos! Smashing stuff up for fun! Robbing banks for fun! Did I say “Eureka!” yet? Well, I did
now. This is a “Eureka!”-type tape, a moment of joyous discovery.
--Ryan Masteller
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