Modeselektor - Modeselektor Presents: Modeselektion Vol.3 (2014)

The latest buzzword making the rounds among the cultural cognoscenti: curation. And while we try to steer clear of hackneyed fads, this one almost slipped the net waxing lyrical about Modeselektor’s Modeselektion Vol. 03. Dodging the tried-and-tested approach of calling a few mates, bagging some shelved tunes, slapping it all together and unleashing the result on the unsuspecting masses, this one is actually all about the art of selection. About careful consideration, motivation, choice, process – that is, a pretty elaborate labour of love that hides intense effort under free-flowing, seamless sounds that sneak up on the ears to broaden our collective horizon.

Modeselektion Vol. 03 is a prime example of this painstaking process – boasting buckets of strictly exclusive tracks, once again hand-picked by Gernot Bronsert and Sebastian Szary. By now, their Modeselektion hall of fame not only features the cute monkey covers and tracklists of Vol. 1 (2010) and Vol. 02 (2012), but als quite a few festival posters and AAA passes that highlight the concept’s live appeal – a. o. at Melt! Festival, UK’s The Warehouse Project and Bloc festival or Geneva’s Electron festival … Whether on vinyl or on stage, any Modeselektion “boils down to whatever we think is hot”, explains Gernot Bronsert. “We suffer from constant music overload, so we use Modeselektion to channel the best of these tunes for the outside world.”

More Modeselektion insights: Any selection is only as great as the distance between its most diverse elements – the greater, the better – but only if the compilation manages to shrink this gap down to nothing in a flash, convincing us that the gloriously heterogeneous mix couldn’t be any more cohesive. Also, any selection improves exponentially with the number of surprises and discoveries.