Farben – Textstar+
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Farben – Textstar+
Holdrons Arcade
135A Rye Lane
Unit 11 Holdrons Arcade
London SE15 4ST
United Kingdom
Label: Faitiche – faitback 12
Format: 2 x Vinyl, LP, Compilation, Reissue, Remastered
Country: Germany
Released: 3 Jun 2022
Genre: Electronic
Style: Micro-House, Minimal, Glitch
Jan Jelinek's work as Farben has occupied a singular position in electronic music since its first appearance in the late 1990s — glitch and micro-house treated not as genre exercises but as a quietly radical reframing of what house music could be made of and what it could do. Textstar+ gathers the four-part EP series originally released between 1998 and 2002, previously compiled in the Textstar and Starbox box set on Klang Elektronik, now remastered by Rashad Becker from Jelinek's original DAT tapes and presented across two LPs via his own Faitiche imprint. Two additional pieces from compilations of the same period complete the picture.
The results are as quietly radical today as they were on first release. Microscopic house structures built from granular textures, flickering rhythms and the kind of detail that rewards close, repeated listening — tracks whose warmth and subtlety emerge slowly, the Farben Says series in particular carrying a sly wit alongside the sonic precision. Artwork by Männer Ohne Nerven, based on photographs of former Red Army Faction members broken down into the four colours of the CMYK model, adds a characteristically pointed conceptual dimension to a release that deserves to be heard by anyone with a serious interest in the history and possibilities of electronic music.
