The Hotel Costes series is renowned the world over for its blend of downbeat, house and electronica. Branching out in a new direction is the first opus of new CD collection Costes Presents… Bon Voyage, mixed by Masmenos is a collection of deep house, beats and psychedelic electronica. This is quite unlike most other mixes in so far that many of the tracks are blended and layered across each other: for example, track two is a blend of four different tunes, of which one particular track is heard in three other places on the album. Whilst it is no DE9 ala Richie Hawtin, it is unique. On the downside it can be difficult to decipher who you are listening to and when, whilst this may not be a problem for the average listener, it does make it hard to review!

As the album starts, a light, warm sweep washes over us, every so softly we hear the drums getting closer until a fat bass line bursts out of nowhere and we start cruising along to some hypnotic deep house. Suddenly the ride screeches to a halt and we are plunged into near silence, and a sparsely populated soundscape stands before us that eventually opens up with some soft synths and steady beat. The dubby vocals that come out of nowhere are a bit of a shock to the instrumental vibe we had grown accustomed to, but before long it is back to the hypnotic grooves that prove to be blissful.

One of the tracks that is damn near impossible not to recognise on here is Willie Colon’s Set Fire To Me, the lyrics un-missable in this sea of unidentified sounds. The vocal track and heavy handed piano work sounding as fresh as it would have in 1986. Things turn a tad dark, as they tend to do as the night evolves, Carl Craig’s Sandstorms providing a nice techy relief to this though. Things close out with the surreal sounds of The Lazer Worshippers Lazer Worshippers Theme, great broken beats sit across a universe of sweeps. Very beautiful music.

As you may have gathered from above it is pretty hard to describe this album as it stands somewhere between a mix, a bootleg and an album, with Masmenos’ own production work scattered throughout. It is a bit of trip listening to this album as I am sure Masomenos intended, however it is only confusing if you try and think about it. So close your eyes, plug in and switch off.

In a word: Psychedelic