Deep

Ror-Shak | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 13, 2007)
• Original Release Date: 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Koch Records
• ASIN: B00006ZY15
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #27,656 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #13 in Music > Dance & DJ > Drum & Bass

Track Listings

1. Lisa's Song

2. Fate or Faith

3. A Forest

4. Golden Cage

5. Rescue Me

6. Interlude No. 1

7. Be There

8. Love & Pride

9. Heist

10. I Don't Want (A Remake)

11. Window Pain

Editorial Reviews

Ror-Shak is an electronic act, fronted by artist's DB ( www.djdb.com ) & Shaun Morris AKA Stakka ( www.cargoindustries.co.uk ). The forthcoming album "Deep" features guest vocals by Julee Cruise, Lisa Shaw, Chantal Claret, Wendy Starland and Mark Holmes. Ror-Shak's album 'Deep' is an exercise in taking an extreme musical form and turing it into something that regular music lovers find enjoyable and exciting, without even knowing its rooted in d&b, while not being boring for the true heads. With live musicians and singers as guests, such as Chantal Claret and Pedro Yanowitz from Morningwood, Lisa Shaw, Wendy Starland and Mark Holmes, the album ended up taking over 12 months to make. Mostly due to Stakka's obsessive attention to detail, his efforts are really evident when listened to on headphones. The name Ror-Shak is a play on the swiss psychiatrist Dr Rorschach, who devolved the ink blot test in which everybody sees something different. In Ror-Shak's case, everyone hears something unique, it's also a tip of the hat to Alan Moore for His Watchman character by the same name.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Solid, Raw Fusion, August 15, 2007

By 

Daniel O. "ojiikun" (Seattle, WA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Deep (Audio CD)

This little gem of an album was a total surprise to me. I originally heard about it (and bought it) our of curiosity about the track "Fate or Faith", which is essentially a rework of the track "I Know" by Hybrid. Given my bias towards Hybrid, it's no surprise that I think that "Fate or Faith" is simply brilliant, with clean layers and a subdued breaksline giving a new spin on a now-classic vocal recording by Julee Cruise.

The rest of the album is similar in many ways. Melodic vocal tracks laid across minimal breaks, drum & bass, and downtempo house. The standout feature of this album, though, is how UNDERproduced it sounds. Ror-Shak clearly laid off the compressors and filters for all the songs, sticking with the hard edges, tight frequencies, and grit of the original samples and recordings. The effect makes the songs sound either musically introspective (an album for producers?) or somehow classic - mixed with certain instrumentation choices, this could have fooled me for an album from a decade or two ago.

Cleverly, the album cover and booklet mirror the production approach - black and white, hard lines, nonstandard and functional.

If I had to guess influences, I would list Hybrid, Weekend Players, mabye some Thievery Corporation, just to give you a starting point. If that sounds like a wide spectrum that's hard to distill onto a single album, you'd be right. This isn't so much a coherent album as a set of independently great songs. Vocals range from dark, to soulful, to even poppy.

It's only a pity that this got released on Koch rather than Zyx, so this is no longer a RIAA-free album.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Who's the chosen fool that we follow..., August 8, 2007

By 

Jorge E. Trujillo "JTR INC" (NC, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Deep (Audio CD)

Heard for the first time on Yahoo music
Captivating me with the atmospheric sounds
Reminding me of DMode, Morcheeba and MAttack's Mezzanine
A delicious candy for my ears
Great recording
Not impressive but very very refreshing for this scorching heat.
Buy it and pray for more

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Varied and, well, "deep". Some finely crafted songs here, April 13, 2010

By 

G. Clark (New Haven, CT United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Deep (Audio CD)

I really like this music. I love Downtempo and Electronica but this is more organic and, yes, "deeper" than a lot of the stuff out there that's starting to sound a lot like muzak to my ears. Good stuff!