s we careen aimlessly towards the heart of this as-yet culturally undefined decade, one city seems to be fiercely grabbing the initiative and attempting to mould an artistic statement from the post-millennial malaise and botox addled detritus; Berlin, we salute you. Thanks to a fortuitous and highly fertile alignment of factors, the relatively cheap living costs and artistically sympathetic authorities (brandishing the all important cheque books…) have seen the German capital flourish—particularly within the sphere of music. Labels such as City Centre Offices, Kitty-Yo, and Morr increasingly set the leftfield agenda whilst diverse artists ranging from the rubber-coated spastic breakcore of Karl Marx Stadt through to the vista-expanding chalky electronica of Ulrich Schnauss are carved deep into any true contemporary music lover’s collection. It is therefore with alarmingly clammy hands and a genuine sense of elation that we are able to bring to you positively the finest export yet from what is shaping up to be one of Berlin’s vintage years. Ladies and Gentlemen be upstanding please for Barbara Morgenstern and Robert Lippok.

Although they may sound suspiciously like a provincial Germanic accountancy firm, Morgenstern and Lippok are actually electronic innovators whose place in the pantheon of digital necromancy is already assured through their solo work and, in Robert Lippok’s case, as card carrying founding member of To Rocco Rot. After the blinding success of their coruscating 2002 12” EP for Domino records, a further cementing of the union was thankfully given the doffed cap by all those involved and Tesri is the box-fresh result. Although as reviewer convention dictates that I should now embark on a series of brief dissertations outlining selected tracks, culminating in a pithy conclusion that ties the whole thing up and firmly gives you a nod, wink and tapped nose concerning Tesri’s quality—I have in fact decided to invert the schematic and spoil the punch line. This album is bloody brilliant and the smoke coming from the chimney is resolutely white…

As the record pulses into life we are met with a chrome fitted set of digital beats and A/C refractory bass which spikely lulls you into the presumption that opening track “Please Wake Me For Meals” has been constructed from the Tour De France blueprint of electronic music. Yet just as you presume to have it bagged and tagged, Lippok and Morgenstern launch a twinkling curve-ball into the mix as, building upwards from a set of shimmering analogue flutters, they lead you down a gently lilting pastoral country-lane with all manner of sunshine drenched (and electronically informed) instrumentation. However rather than drown you in saccharine whimsy, “Please Wake Me for Meals” retains a distinct bite and clarity thanks to the growling, Styx saturated electro underbelly juxtaposed throughout as it puffs gloriously sooted and caliginous clouds of unfiltered digitalis up amongst the privet hedged instrumentation. Sharing an understanding for the need to texture both light and shade with the likes of Kieran Hebden, Minotaur Shock, and Magnetophone, Morgenstern and Lippok have created a florid opening track that serves not just to set the bar for themselves altitude-sickeningly high, but also fires a warning shot over the electronic music scene’s increasingly insular (read: unlistenable…) hordes.

Bringing an overtly human touch to proceedings is London based Japanese singer Mieko Shimizo (aka Apache 61), who contributes a gloriously contained vocal performance on the bubbling IDM laced electronica of “Kaitusburi,” as well as the brief spoken-word epilogue on the piano staccato (almost Cornelius-like in its wildly spiralling structure) of “Otuskimi.” However the collaboration that’ll be prompting most indietronica chin dribbles is that of Telefon Tel Aviv’s Damon Aaron whose 2004’s Map of What is Effortless must rank amongst Tesri’s most ardent peers. Taking a high-end, compressed electronic melody as its focal point, “If the Day Remains Unspoken For” builds to a restrained, yet utterly effulgent, peak through Aaron’s repeated sweat soul refrain of “You’re not gonna bring me down…” and could easily serve as a companion piece to his own heart tugger “I Lied.”

Elsewhere Morgenstern grabs the mic (albeit only for humming duties) on the shockingly perfect crisp ‘n’ dry instrumentronica of “Sommer,” “White Wise Rabbit” cheekily skanks a DJ Shadow melody then hoses it down into a velvet-hearted set of Eno washes and hardboiled clicks & cuts, whilst “Einn Kinoten Aus Schwarz” sounds much as you imagine Kid A would have if Thom Yorke et al had gotten Björk in for production duties. Closing with “Winter,” wherein a sparse electronic heart is garnished by thickets of warm and syrupy acoustic rectitude, Lippok and Morgenstern put forward a record that, if indicative of things to come, suggests the rest of this decade will be indulgently heady times indeed for all us music lovers. Viva la Berlin!