Brooklyn-based DJ/Composer Morgan Geist is one of electronic music's yeoman, quietly advancing the cause of several labelmates and collaborators while rarely taking a star turn himself. While he has a couple of albums to his credit-- 1997's eponymous solo turn and his lauded collaborations with Darshan Jesrani as Metro Area-- if his name has flittered by your eyes in the last half-decade or so it's likely due to his label, Environ, and its increasingly high profile or for his now-seminal mix, Unclassics, re-unearthed last year as a common "next step" for newly minted Italo-disco fans. So Geist's second solo artist album comes slapped not just with a cheeky title-- Double Night Time-- and high-profile guest vocals from the Junior Boys' Jeremy Greenspan but with toe-tapping "it's about damn time"-anxiety.
Geist's 2006 remix of the Junior Boys' "The Equalizer" was the first clue, but Greenspan and Geist prove a natural fit. Whereas Geist's previous work had spun through excitable rave-pop (The Driving Memoirs) and electro-lounge cool (Metro Area), an older Geist mines the same lightly frosted pop sounds of Greenspan's Boys. Indeed, it's a patient, subdued album for the time in your life when Saturday questions like "Where are all my friends tonight?" have uneasy, obvious answers ("Married, the suburbs").
That type of experience begets compositions that are skillful, but subtly so; Geist makes his sequencers and drum machines hum so efficiently that no one-- man nor machine-- breaks a sweat. It's a cloistered record-- with a uniform textuality-- that threatens to sound sterile as a result. The tempos remain even as well: Greenspan's voice isn't suited for rave-ups, but Double Night Time features few ballads, leaving almost every track in a milky midtempo soup. Geist's programming expertise has always leaned towards the expertly prepared rather than the sonically adventurous, and Double Night Time rarely surprises: It sounds like a control variable for future electronic pop experiments.
Double Night Time's real draw is Greenspan, who is at least not obviously saving bullets for the next Junior Boys album. It's a little strange to hear the relative newcomer tip-toe his way through "Detroit", Geist's tribute to motorik blends of Carl Craig and Derrick May, but by the time "The Shore" hits, the duo have found even terrain. Singing mostly Geist's lyrics, Greenspan matches Geist's veteran presence, detailing not the combustible dalliances of teenagers but the well-spaced hardships of adults. Relationships have pasts, and possibly futures; reflection is spread over years, not weeks. "Ruthless City" is their greatest triumph, Geist offering a minimal, mousy squeak and Greenspan seeking answers-- "My best friend/ He once was yours/ He gave you all his love and money"-- going on breathlessly enough that Geist is forced to build the track into something of a climax. The track muddies the distinction between "ruthless" and "truthless" as the sequencers muscle and whir. The refreshingly busy chorus of "The Shore" speaks of "panicked, backward glances," a fine encapsulation of urban adulthood.
Double Night Time lags, though: the mostly instrumental tracks, "Lullaby" and "Nocebo" chief among them, are soggy and trying. Despite the album's most evocative title and Greenspan's only co-writing credit, "City of Smoke and Flame" finds too much comfort amid muted bass thumps. "Palace Life" is the only track that might crowd a dance floor, but there's no hook save a wordless choir as the track pounds to a close. Geist's contributions to electronica have always seemed fringe-- label head, remix specialist, in-demand crate digger-- and it's once again nice for him to have something to put his own name on. But after years of waiting, Double Night Time confirms that Geist is most valuable behind the curtain.
