Martinou – Rift (2021)

In my long-running tradition of including an album in my year-end list that wasn’t released in that calendar year, this is doubly cheeky because I actually bought this at the back end of 2021 – now nearly two years ago. As tends to happen with albums I buy digitally, it fell through the cracks a bit and it wasn’t until this year that I fully appreciated how good it was – so good, in fact, that I bought it on a physical format (vinyl only, unfortunately), so I have now paid for it twice. Oh well! This is deliciously deep and inviting home-listening techno. Early highlight Submerged gains momentum from a lovely octave jump in the bass-line before the delightfully shimmery keyboards gradually join in. Later, Thunder Road utilises a similar octave trick but this time as a regular pulse at a more insistent tempo that contrasts with the slow-moving, wistful chords that alternate over the top, before gradually ushering in a gentle melody line. And so on. Lovely stuff and particularly beguiling on headphones.