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(Om Records/Stomp)
Rithma is the recording name used by 23 year-old Los Angeles based artist Etienne Stehelin. Stehelin has been producing his own distinctive brand of smooth, jazzy deep house since the late 1990s. With a solid background in jazz guitar and a zeal for music in general, it wasn’t going to take long before a quality label picked up on this bloke’s talents. Music Fiction is his first full-length record and has been released on the distinguished and sophisticated San Francisco based record label, Om Records.
On Music Fiction, Rithma incorporates a variety of non-electronic instruments, including percussion, clarinet, guitar and his own unpretentious but at times stocko blue-eyed soul vocals, with electronic tools commonly used by dance music producers. He has come up with an album that, at times, achieves a tidy balance between what a dance floor requires and jazz, blues, folk and rock sensibilities, however it does get a tad irritating when it leans towards new age ambience in some tracks. Rithma himself describes his record as: “Fiction is the idea of creating imaginary things,”... “I suppose music is that in the first place, but I really tried to make this album a whole story as one piece rather than just a bunch of tracks.” It seems as if he has tried just a little too hard to give meaning to songs rather than let them speak for themselves, and there are plenty there that have a voice.
Amongst the 17 tracks presented on this over-lengthy album there are some that do tickle my fancy enough to get excited over. “Make You Mine” is a deep, dubby house number with some excellent understated vocals from Monica Brooke. “Flying Over the City” is jazzy house wonderfully punctuated by a woodwind sample from the Jacaranda Ensemble. “Mr Lofgren” is a haunting jazz/blues number with some beautiful guitar work by the Roadtripper, and I adore “The Cigarette Song” with its smokey clarinet over the top of down tempo moody beats.
Rithma at least must be applauded in his attempts to provide a smorgasbord of sounds, moods and textures without sticking to the tried and tested. The music is pleasant enough, although it does lack in bite on occasion. The vocals can get a bit naff at times as Rithma attempts to straddle a no-mans land between the dance floor and the couch. However, the instrumentals on the CD are decent enough without being too threatening. Rithma also appears to suffer from what I label ‘good muso’s syndrome’, in that some tracks are technically very well written and played but artistically lacking in uniqueness and that ‘something special’.
Rithma is, however, one to keep an eye on in the near future. It’s certainly evident from Music Fiction that he has the musical ability to do even better things, especially at the smooth, jazz end of Housetown, it remains to be seen, however, if that ability translates into something less new age and more distinctive.
