Colder & Heat

Marc Nguyen Tan, aka Colder, impressed a wide range of people with his debut album 'Again'. This year sees him return with an equally excellent follow up, having remixed Depeche Mode and toured in the interim. Some have compared the sound to Joy Division, but Colder's music is never quite as tortured as Ian Curtis' offerings. The mood has always been a kind of subdued melancholy rather than outright anguish, with smoky jazz samples on Downtown and the slow thripping drum roll on Losing Myself. On My Mind is the most introverted song on the album, with its hollow vacuum tube loop and minimal clicking drums.

Heat is not all wallowing however, with it's dirty bass guitar and bold kick drums, 'To The Music' is a very danceable post-punk track, something that could easily have come from Playgroup or Tom Vek.. Overall, the album feels like a Gitane cigarette - sleek, French, and full of tar - but oh so satisfying.

Colder - Downtown
Colder - To the Music