The deluxe edition of Isles last years introduced us to the first part of “Meli,” the ambient edition if you will. And halfway through this year, we were treated with the astonishingly good counterpart to the original. Something so beautiful and ethereal that belongs in a museum of sound, if there ever was one.
Bicep explained the creation and the evolution of “Meli” as follows: “Meli (I)” was a beatless track on ‘Isles Deluxe’,” they explain. “Truth be told we just couldn’t get a drum version right in the studio throughout the pandemic, there were many failed demo versions whilst we were working on ‘Isles’, it just never felt like it worked. We always knew there was room for this version though, hence naming the original “Meli (I)”. “Meli (II)” was formed slowly on the road. Each week we changed the drums a bit, the structure and generally allowed the crowd to inform the process. It was great to grow the track in this way, it felt like a very organic way of working.”
The melodic variety of Meli (II) may not follow the typical structure of today’s hard-hitting techno, but in the traditional sense, it’s 100 percent techno. In fact, the best of 2022.