NK*AK - Dollar Album Review

NK*AK is the current alias of Newcastle-based producer Andrew Scott, a man who's spent the last six years releasing music under this and various other guises. Following on from 2015's Laid EP, Dollar is another tastefully constructed quartet of tracks which stray in the direction of house's deeper side.

This is neither new or particularly revolutionary field to be in of course, so keeping the quality high and the grooves intuitive is something of a given for anyone with half an eye on resonating much beyond the scene's glass ceiling. At its peak, Dollar breaks through it with aplomb: on  Goodbye, a naggingly simple piano loop and jazzy, laid back keys recall the Latin/Disco pomp of early noughties doyens Metro Area.

This lost-in-the-moment vibe also runs through the tones of opener Xager, which features North East based compadre Ian Blevins - although exactly what he gets up isn't fully explained.  Slightly more upfront with an insistent hi-hat and an abstract hand clap beat, it's still one for those who prefer their resting pulse rate to stay of the low side of 60, despite the later introduction of a warmer set of transitional phrases at around the midway point.

Where Dollar gets interesting though is on Shadow, on which the casual Saturday night ethic is largely stripped away in favour of a very down tempo, creeping rhythm that's full of nervous tics, before resolving into a spectral funk located way uptown from the opening gloom. Rounding things out, the title track is a far more expectation-pleasing cut that returns the exercise to a more traditional footing, by extension lacking the atmospheric lock in of its predecessor.

Not different then, but not quite the same. As a name to check Andrew Scott remains on "Good" list, but needs to explore more of his inner guru to move onto the "Great" one.