Album Review: Mario & Vidis – Changed

Representing Lithuania since 2007 comes the chilled, hypnotic grooves of electronic duo Mario & Vidis. Ever since their first release, a remix for Atjazz and Robert Owens which was picked up by Gilles Peterson and Pete Tong amongst others, the duo has gained quite the fanbase. The sound of the duo is best described as a relaxed fuse of hypnotic soundscapes and a mug of soulful warmth reminiscing of the aforementioned Atjazz and Parov Stellar. The two-disc Changed is their debut album, and it is very interesting.

Changed is basically a collection of the duo’s work collated from nearly three years of studio time, a partnership that started with the aptly named “Test”. Coming from a cold and desolate area, Mario & Vidis have portrayed dismal visions of past life whilst scratching below the frozen surface to find soothing hospitality in abundance. One major theme of the album, and a prominent production tool utilised in many of its tracks is delay. In tracks like ‘In My System’ and Changed’ the duo apply this trick to their Leftfield-like percussive melodies that keeps their succinct beats – as well as ‘ISM’ where the duo employ delay directly to Ernesto’s smoky chorus. It seems a bit strange for the album to be songs, rather than tracks when on the subject of dance music. Well-selected vocalists sing entire lyrical compositions along with bobbing basslines and clear cut strings –one of them being Giedre with her soulful presence in ‘Slow’. Then again with a more sombre groove in ‘Suspend the Feeling’. The jazzy instrumental ‘When Nobody Listens’ is very satisfying – it’s a delicious palette of melancholic samples and soothing saxophones that create a text-book outro.

As I work my way through CD 2 I can already hear the disc drifting in the opposite direction of CD1. There’s an exhibited feel for mechanics in ‘Plastic People’ which the melds into the portentous swagger of ‘In My System’ (Dub Redo) – I can’t seem to pin point the similarity… With Black Boogie being polished in deep house jam, spread with clicking percussion and brooding bass chords, and the subtly textured number Kashyyyk proves having an atmospheric structure to Star Wars [not to mention being named after the Wookie home planet - Ed], isn’t half bad. Not to say that disc two lacks for some great tunes, drawing to an end of Disc 2, I find Demo.Lition parts 1 and 2 disappear, taking a long winding road through Mario & Vidis’s technical range only to arrive back in the safer territory of Adventurous Instrumental Music – which still grasps on to those oddly confusing sounds displayed in previous tracks.

Apart from the minor mis-steps of Disc 2, the rest of the album does share a characterist diverse collection of stand-out tunes. Changed demonstrates two sides of accessible, thoroughly developed and highly memorable deep house style of Mario & Vidis, which gives it a technical side whilst still maintaning an innovative edge – sophisticated enough for the arbiter.

- Tom Morse