(F Communications/Creative Vibes)

F Communications’ long-running ‘Megasoft Office’ compilation series has become one of the label’s more intriguing offerings in recent years, with each new annual installment offering curious listeners a chance to check out the sorts of sounds from the label currently on rotation in the F-Comm Paris headquarters. This latest volume ‘Megasoft 2005’ shows the F-Comm crew trying something slightly different, with this latest compilation being dedicated to the countless demos that make their way to the F-Comm office every day, and collects together ten tracks by unsigned artists that represent particular ‘crushes’ that in a perfect world, the independent and thus financially constrained imprint would be able to sign and release. Drawing from a diverse range of unsigned artists hailing from France, England and Czechoslovakia, ‘Megasoft Office 2005’ is also designed to be a release with an ephemeral existence, with this latest volume being deleted permanently from the label’s catalogue 12 months after its release.

While this compilation is composed primarily of the work of unsigned artists, the track that opens this release ‘Think’ comes from F-Comm artist Alexkid and captures the French electronic producer live in action alongside pedal steel guitar legend B.J. Cole and trumpet player Paolo Fresu at 2004’s Factory festival, deep slow tribal tabla loops rolling beneath hypnotic layers of droning synth orchestration, while Cole’s slow-burning guitar bends wind their way through the haze around Fresu’s melancholic muted calls, creating a numbed sense of dubbed-out slow jazz ambience that acts as a perfect sweeping intro whilst also setting the contemplative, atmospheric and frequently melancholic tone that predominates throughout this album. Ecoplan’s ‘Bumblebee Pop’ takes things down into glacial yet emotive IDM that calls to mind comparisons with the likes of Proem and Plaid, delicate analog tones making their way over a metronomic, stripped-down backing of clicking beats, while all manner of crunching effects and buzzing waspy synths slide around the rhythms, while Metronome’s classical piano cover of Laurent Garnier & Shazz’s classic Transmat 12” ‘Acid Eiffel’ offers up perhaps the biggest unexpected curveball here, whilst also managing to draw attention to the highly melodic construction of the original track and casting it in a completely new light.

Plonn’s epic ‘Many Hours Passed’ was easily my personal highlight as well as the centrepiece of this compilation, with epic guitar rock theatrics and soaring vocals that call to mind Radiohead’s post ‘Kid A’ period, ricocheting vast percussive rhythms building inexorably into a wall of noise beneath delicate guitars and icy synthetics before the entire track crawls away amidst buzzing electronics and contorted rhythms, before Coral Cove’s ‘Northbridge’ locks things down into a slow shuffling hiphop groove that manages to carry a slight sense of restrained menace beneath its slow delicate keyboard tones and clicking beats, some rapidly manipulated and spun Japanese station announcer samples adding to the sense of surreal disorientation. Octowire’s jazz-flavoured ‘The New York Grill’ scatters samples of what sounds like a busy NYC diner kitchen over swinging double-bass runs, tinkling pianos and minimal clicking electronic rhythms, creating a sense of hyper-cut digital jazz similar to the work of Burnt Friedman, before The Flow’s ‘Final’ takes things to a sweeping close amidst delicate orchestral pop that calls to mind some meeting point between Patrick Wolf’s electronic-laced productions and the dark cabaret of The Real Tuesday Weld, relentlessly mechanical beats powering their way forward beneath fuzzed-out drones and strangely Middle Eastern-sounding horns.

An excellent compilation from F-Com that manages to draw together a stunning and diverse selection of new music from a range of unsigned artists from around the world, whilst also casting a new angle on the ‘Megasoft’ compilation series that yields one of its most interesting chapters yet. If like me, you’d stepped away from the ‘Megasoft’ series for its last few chapters, now is the perfect time to dip back in – and given the limited lifespan planned for this release, you’d best not waste time…

Check out http://www.fcom.fr.