Soulwax
Any Minute Now

THE REVIEW

Preceded by the eponymous single, the long-awaited third new work by the Belgian band led by the Dewaele brothers is finally available, six years after the previous "Much Against Everyone’s Advice." There is no doubt that Soulwax mixes, with a boldness that flirts equally with genius and madness, some of the most disparate genres and sounds.

The blend of distorted guitars and drum machines underpinning Soulwax's sound is nothing revolutionary in itself: despite the manifest schizophrenia of some episodes, the overall balance is more than positive, thanks mainly to a handful of hybrid tracks that are difficult to categorize. The production and mixing of Any Minute Now were entrusted to Flood and Alan Moulder, already seen working with top stars such as U2, Depeche Mode, and Smashing Pumpkins. At the opposite ends of primarily rock-rooted tracks such as the first single "Any Minute Now," "Miserable Girl" or the noisy "Krack," we find the bold dance of "NY Excuse" or the sly crooning of "A Ballad To Forget."

Upon first listen, one is so bewildered that it seems the Soulwax project slips out of the Dewaele brothers' hands, ultimately giving way to the chaos that underlies their multifaceted creativity. A creativity that sees them engaged in their "spare time" remixing other artists' tracks under the pseudonym 2 Many Djs. Yet never has the first impression proven to be as misleading as in this case. The consistency of Any Minute Now is not traceable to a strict stylistic mark but rather an anarchic sound that is in reality very well structured and expertly enhanced by the production of Flood.