Tomas Jirku

Toronto artist Tomas Jirku suddenly found himself on Europe's leading label for experimental dancefloor techno, Force Inc, at the end of 2000 with his Sequins album. Yet another of the label's timely foray into the minimal sounds of computer-composed songs created with only the slightest aspects of traditional techno/house -- dub-bass foundations, looped beats, slight aural atmospheres, a composite sense of rhythm -- Jirku's style does differ a bit from the label's other major artists such as Stewart Walker, Exos, and Vladislav Delay. His style involves deconstructing music to its most essential elements: beats. Like Wolfgang Voigt's influential series of ultra-minimal Studio One records, Jirku doesn't mess with strings or aural atmospheres or anything like that; he takes skeletal beats and transforms them into rather intricate rhythms worthy of a dancefloor -- except he keeps his rhythms as sparse as possible and also conveys a sense of gentleness. Then he adds the infamous "glitch" (aka clicks + cuts) sound to his tracks. At the time of this album's release in 2000, Force Inc seemed to monopolize this evolving sound, and Jirku's application of glitch-composed rhythms fits right in with the label's agenda. The fact that Jirku's rhythms are less locked into techno and house's oft-4/4 groove and actually more in line with the versatile grooves of '70s funk differentiates the many variations of the same formula on Sequins from Force Inc's roster of already established glitch artists. It's a fairly engaging style, and it seems mighty fresh circa 2000, but the album becomes a bit of a dull listen about halfway through once the novelty of the inventive approach begins to wear thin, leaving the listener with the idea that Jirku seems a bit short on variety here. ~ Jason Birchmeier, All Music Guide