John Tejada
Daydreams in Cold Weather
[Plug Research; 2002]
Rating: 6.7
John Tejada's fifth album is his first for L.A.'s peerless IDM glitch-pop label Plug Research. Tejada's
previous releases have appeared on the UK's A13 and DeFocus labels, as well as his own Palette operation,
and his recent move to Plug Research is a logical one: Tejada contributed to the excellent L.A. techno
compilation Dublab Presents: Freeways that also featured Plug Research's finest, Daedalus and
Dntel, and he also mastered Soulo's self-titled debut.
Daydreams in Cold Weather features twelve takes on clinically melodic IDM with a smattering of
laboratory electro and a faint whiff of drum-n-bass. Given how connected Tejada is to Plug Research, I
find it odd that this album is most reminiscent "Artificial Intelligence"-era Black Dog Productions.
What hallmarks a Tejada production is the intricacy with which he arranges each element of a track. His
precision is deceptively transparent. It's easy, in fact, to be awed by the overall flow of the track and
not to pay close attention to how Tejada has put it all together. A superb example of this is "Young."
The track begins as a Xerox of Friend & Dr. Kosmos' version of the Clash's "Career Opportunities" before
incorporating that signature bassline into what I imagine a Black Dog/Pete Namlook collaboration might
sound like. Likewise, the moody "Shifted" rejects the jauntiness of the opener, "To the West," thereby
making an undeniable case for its inclusion in a set by Certificate 18's Norwegian post-drum-n-bass genius,
Polar.
Occasionally, though, Tejada slips up. The wistful "Summer Rain" sounds weedy and unsure, with a drum
pattern that offers none of the rhythmic bobbing and weaving I've come to expect from his records. Yet
at other times Tejada can be as precise as heat-seeking missile-- "Rehearsing Disaster," for example,
snatches some of Squarepusher's manic energy and channels it into meticulous rhythmic detailing rather
than Tom Jenkinson's freaky jumble.
"Abre Los Ojos"-- no doubt a tribute to Alejandro Amenábar's disturbing and provocative film of the same
title (the one Cameron Crowe neutered for Vanilla Sky)-- features a heavily processed vocal sample
of Tejada's operatic soprano mom, Carmen. Fortunately, Tejada doesn't choose the facile route to success
by turning the track into an Enigma or Enya knock-off, instead threading the modified voice through the
background out of which acidic squiggles and off-kilter percussion stalk across a mechanoid landscape.
Instrumental hip-hop also creeps into Daydreams in Cold Weather. Tejada's previous album, The
Matrix of Us, was the first time I'd heard him divert from his abundant love of uncut Detroit techno.
While The Matrix of Us was no Endtroducing, I found Tejada's application of techno's automated
sterility to hip-hop fascinating, and Mo'Wax's mystic tongue Divine Styler added hugely to the success of
the endeavor. Divine Styler returns here to give his cool power to "The Silence of Us"-- a deliberation on
inexpressible realities.
While I can find little to fault Daydreams in Cold Weather, I must say that I expected more from
Tejada's first appearance on Plug Research. This isn't so much an indictment of Tejada, more a testament to
the originality that Plug Research artists usually provide in spades. Rumor has it that the forthcoming
Low Res album, Blue Ramen, will blow minds just as Daedelus' Invention and Dntel's Life
Is Full of Possibilities have unequivocally done. Here's hoping that Daydreams in Cold Weather
is Tejada setting up base camp before joining the others on their pioneering excursions beyond conformity
and into innovation.
-Paul Cooper, July 29th, 2002