Chris Liebing, Ralf Hildenbeutel - Another Night (2022)

Chris Liebing and Ralf Hildenbeutel were both major contributors to the German techno and trance scene in the 1990s, particularly through their work with Frankfurt's Eye-Q Records. Similar to how Hildenbeutel was responsible for much of the production and songwriting on Sven Väth's early albums, he also did a lot of the heavy lifting on a pair of Chris Liebing albums for Mute, 2018's Burn Slow and 2021's Another Day. Both of those albums featured dark, shivering techno tracks as well as atmospheric, downtempo experiments and Depeche Mode-like electro-pop, and Another Night refocuses the second album entirely for club usage. Producers such as Radio Slave and Nicole Moudaber take inspiration from early trance without necessarily trying to emulate the style, drawing out the hypnotic qualities of the tracks and judiciously incorporating arpeggiated melodies. Tom Adams' own remix of "Circles" seems to match his lyrics ("Sometimes I'm rising, sometimes I'm falling") with a steadily paced yet broken beat pattern, resulting in one of the more abstract moments on this release. Anfisa Letyago's swift remix of "10 West" makes head-turning usage of sliced-and-diced breakbeats, which add extra spikes of energy to the more straightforward techno beats. Plaid largely stay out of the way for their mix of "Fault Line," letting the late Miles Cooper Seaton's half-spoken lyrics resonate, elevated by analog synth atmosphere and unsettling echoes. The second half of Another Night is dominated by in-house club mixes, placing pounding kick drums front and center. Most of these tracks were instrumentals on the original album, and the existing vocals have largely been vaporized for these mixes. The tense, stuttery "Cause & Effect (Club Mix)" and vibrant, driving "Something Half Way (Alternative Club Mix)" are especially pulse-quickening. The trippy, midtempo bonus track "Learning to Fly" provides the soundtrack to shuffling out of the club at dawn. As ambitious and risky as Another Day was, the club retoolings on Another Night are generally more successful.
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