HIS CAREER behind the decks and in the studio, fostering the techno scene in his home city of Frankfurt, spanning its third decade now, Chris Liebing shows no signs of either losing his edge nor his acuity at a creating a banger.
His new opus, Another Day, is out on Mute just a day more than a fortnight – you’ll find ordering details below – and he’s dropped one final nugget of vocal-tech groove to get you yearning for a befogged 3am warehouse; it’s called “Circles”, with former Berlin and now Cornish resident singer Tom Adams lending a languorous bpm prophet’s lyric to proceedings.
Something about the way the relaxed, declamatory vocal plays out over the crunchy, pulsing drive of the groove puts me in mind of The Beloved less loved up and sprawled in the chillout room, but absolutely euphoric and in the melee of the grand arena. It’s a big music for big occasions.
Chris says: “Daniel Miller had the idea for Tom Adams and I to collaborate on something for the album. I met with Tom just before the pandemic started, and played him rough cuts of some instrumental versions.
“Immediately, without much thinking, we agreed upon two tracks and the following day Tom called me up and asked if I could come by his studio as he had already written vocals. I was blown away.
“Take a close listen to the lyrics, as Tom has captured the nightlife cycle of finding yourself in ‘Circles’.”
That lyric runs: “Become the dreamer / A star ascending / With open eyes / With open eyes
“Until I feel tired / The cycle begins again / I’m caught in this tide / And sometimes I’m rising / And sometimes I’m falling”.
“As with the whole album and all of the vocalists involved, I am very humbled and happy to work with talents such as Tom. It’s an incredible experience in itself.”
“Circles” follows the monochrome patterning of “Whispers And Wires” and the mantric “Something Half Way” in processing towards the new album. On this evidence, reckon it’s gonna be hot.
The singers were given free rein to interpret Chris’s music as they saw fit, freely turning the track in other directions. lyrics to the artists he worked with.
“I thought: let’s not burden all these vocalists with my thoughts,” he says. “I wanted to get as much of my own ego out of this process as possible and leave a lot of room for interpretation.”
Elsewhere on another Another Day expect vocal turns from Akron/Family founder Miles Cooper Seaton, in one of his last sessions before his untimely passing in a road accident; Polly Scattergood takes the lead on a track, and Sink Ya Teeth’s Maria Uzor, fresh from her contributions to A Certain Ratio’s masterful ACR Loco, also lends a hand.
Chris has a string of live dates right across Europe and Stateside coming up from later this week and on towards Christmas, as follows:
Saturday, November 6th, Miami, Space;
Wednesday, November 10th, Katowice, ‘Mayday’ at Spodek;
Friday, November 12th, New York, Avant Gardner;
Saturday, November 13th, Toronto, Coda;
Friday, November 19th, Lille, ‘Jardin d’Automne’ at Le Grand Sud;
Saturday, November 20th, London, Rotherhithe, ‘Exhale’ at The Printworks;
Friday, November 26th, The Vaults, Cardiff;
Saturday, November 27th, Karlsruhe, Got Club;
Saturday, December 4th, Basel, Nordstern;
Friday, December 10th, Frankfurt, Freud;
Saturday, December 11th, ‘I Love Techno’ at the Parc des Expositions, and
Saturday, December 18th, ‘We Love Techno Switzerland’ at Papierfabrik, Solothurn, Switzerland.
Chris Liebing’s Another Day will be released by Mute digitally, on CD and on double vinyl on November 19th; it’s available to pre-save and pre-order now.
