Browse by Artist: BODYCODE

Artist:	BODYCODE
Title:	The Conservation of Electric Charge
Label:	SPECTRAL SOUND
Format:	CD
Price:	$15.50
Catalog #:	SPC 037CD

This is the first album from Lisbon, Portugal-based Alan Abrahams under the alias Bodycode. Abrahams has earned a lot of attention -- his releases as Portable have garnered near-universal acclaim for their deft fusion of tribal rhythms and a modern micro-house sensibility. As Bodycode, he focuses on the more dancefloor-oriented aspects of his style, yielding a gorgeous album born from the belief that the psyche can be unlocked via the body. Bodycode also came from necessity -- while on tour playing club dates, Abrahams was compelled to seek the most engaging sound for that environment. Remarkably adept at its task, Bodycode's mesmerizing percussive arrangements and subtle melodic flourishes create an immediately engaging sound that lingers in the mind long after the club has closed.

Artist:	BODYCODE
Title:	What Did You Say (feat. Lerato)
Label:	SPECTRAL SOUND
Format:	12"
Price:	$12.00
Catalog #:	SPC 071EP

Alan Abraham aka Bodycode presents a cut featuring the thick female voice of Lerato, which gradually mutates and floats off into space, revealing tight, jacking rhythms and romantic dancefloor universalism. An exclusive dub version of the Immune album cut, "Imitation Lover" deepens the scope with an ever-ascending organ line and a swarm of microscopic percussion pin-pricks. Baby Ford remixes the title track down to a crawl and beefs up the bass, so it feels like walking underwater.

Artist:	BODYCODE
Title:	Immune
Label:	SPECTRAL SOUND
Format:	CD
Price:	$15.50
Catalog #:	SPC 072CD

This is the second full length release by Alan Abrahams as Bodycode for Spectral Sound. Differing from his output as Portable, these tracks have itchy feet and busy brains, chugging along at a brisk clip while cramming in enough rhythmic detail to make one's head spin. Alan grew up in post-Apartheid South Africa, where polyrhythmic percussion first entered his bloodstream; he then lived in Portugal for years, sweating it out in Lisbon's club scene while absorbing the sounds of electronic dance music and releasing tracks via numerous aliases. Three years after releasing 2006's The Conservation of Electric Charge (SPC 037CD/LP) on Spectral Sound, the man known as Bodycode moved from Lisbon to Berlin. Now, Teutonic house music's taut, jacking rhythms form the core of Immune. The album opens with the super-sub-bass pulse and cool atmospherics of "Meaning And Memory," a track which already sounds worlds away from Conservation's tech-y clicks 'n cuts. Following that track's sleek efficiency is "Hyperlight," a galloping, end-over-end beat chasing endlessly after an elusive vocal sample that always seems one step ahead of the kick drum. Vocal samples humanize Immune's technological edge, providing heavy-lidded narration on lead single "What Did You Say" and lending the click-clacking "Imitation Lover" an old-school diva charm. Immune's closing moments are some of its loveliest, as the title track dresses up its drum-machine beat in chillingly distant piano chords and some low-slung gospel harmonies. Fittingly, Bodycode's biggest musical step forward features a chorus of baritones aptly warbling, "Nothing in this world is immune from change."

Artist:	BODYCODE
Title:	A Document of an African Past
Label:	YORE RECORDS (GERMANY)
Format:	12"
Price:	$12.00
Catalog #:	YORE 006EP

"With multiple releases on Background Records, ~scape, and Ghostly/Spectral already under his belt, Alan Abrahams (aka Bodycode and Portable) presents a fabulous fusion of ultra-deep house and Afro-futurism on his Yore debut A Document of an African Past. Abrahams sounds positively unleashed on the twelve-minute A-side, 'The Centre of Time,' which pushes the Bodycode sound farther than ever before. After opening with scattered flurries of African percussion, a warbling bass line emerges, asserting some degree of control, before a skipping pulse and voice yelps send the track on its way. Abrahams has shown himself in the past to be a master builder when it comes to weaving layers into intricate masses and does the same here, too. Halfway through the piece, a breakdown occurs, allowing percussion flourishes to re-appear, now accompanied by a voiceover, before the tune kicks into gear again even more ferociously for the ride home. Abrahams continues to amaze, regardless of whether the material appears under the Portable or Bodycode guise. Note: unfortunately, the title of the record got 'twisted' in the design process and, consequently, the label displays A Document of an American Past when it should be African."

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