Marco di Dominicis is fluent in Italian; I am, to date, not. Consequently, I find myself largely unable to decipher his liner notes to Fast Asleep, a fact which would normally cause me some degree of distress, owing to my megalomaniacal desire to know everything at all times. That, however, is the true beauty of James Bradell's fourth release as Funki Porcini; it makes me not want to learn Italian. In fact, over the album's duration and some time thereafter, I don't feel the need to pick up any of the Romance languages, or do much of anything else for that matter. Instead, for a few brief moments, simply sitting and listening seems pretty great all by itself.
Bradell, in his own subtly inimitable fashion, has created here an exceptionally personal album, though not in a particularly "revelatory" sense. Rather, this is an album most easily enjoyed in quiet solitude, as an entity all its own. Since becoming one of the original South London Ninja masters in 1995, Bradell's take on classic ambient downbeat has fallen in step with that of labelmates Amon Tobin and Coldcut, but now the emphasis is sharply on "ambient." Heavily treated vocal samples are the sounds of the outside world slipping away, or trying in vain to intrude into this almost accidentally cool dream state. There's still a fair share of jazz-infused breaks hiding out in the sweetly atonal fog, but they never arrive without warning or stay long enough to get the blood up; the last thing Bradell wants to do is quicken a pulse.
Nevertheless, Fast Asleep isn't nearly as soporific as the title would imply, creating the sensation of a restful state somewhere in the nebulous territory between sleep and wakefulness. Even though his loungy breakbeats have been relaxed, the trip-hop technician that produced the genre marker Hed Phone Sex hasn't disappeared. Now song structures drift in and out like afterthoughts or mild hallucinations, dissolving back to component particles rather than merely concluding. It's actually difficult not to feel very slightly disappointed when the more impressive compositions, from the slithering, Tobin-esque vibe of "50,000 Ft. Freefall" to the crystalline breaks of "Weow", simply disappear into the ambiance, or are resculpted into the next track. The continuous morphing from point to point doesn't allow real closure, but still reinforces the flow of the album as a single, massive arrangement, which is the whole idea anyway.
A few of these tunes are fully realized animals, though, like the astonishing centerpiece, "The Great Drive-By", which throws some question on the effectiveness of this album-centric release. Deep, dark currents of near-tuneless noise are instant reminders of a Boards of Canada arrangement along the lines of "Everything You Do Is a Balloon" or "The Beach at Redpoint", right down to the slow-motion breakbeat. Alternately uplifting and unnerving, "Drive-By" is a brilliant testament to what Bradell can do when he focuses on crafting a single track (instead of an entire album) from start to finish. Like every other song on Fast Asleep, it's slick and evocative, but, unlike many of the others, it's also more capable of supporting itself while bolstering the album as a whole. So, is it really necessary that an impressive monument to relaxation like this also be comprised of impressive individual songs, even when it works so well as a unit? Well, no, but if the excellence of "Drive-By" is any indication, it couldn't hurt.
