Live at Robert Johnson, Vol. 8 * [880319528521]

DJ: Dixon.
Recording information: The Ille, Toronto.
The last installment in the Live at Robert Johnson mix series --only the eighth in a brief but fruitful two-year run for the eponymous Frankfurt nightclub -- was announced as not only the end of the line for the still-young series, but also, more regrettably, the final mix offering from the masterful DJ Dixon, whose past efforts have included the excellent Body Language 4 and (in collaboration with Ame and Henrik Schwarz) The Grandfather Paradox. In any event, Live at Robert Johnson, Vol. 8 finds both the series and Dixon's mix career going out on a high note, with a very satisfying, beautifully paced, highly personal, and idiosyncratic selection. Probably the mix's most notable idiosyncrasy -- aside from its penchant for sometimes-effective, sometimes-distracting, earnestly intoned spoken vocals -- is its extreme patience: although a nominal pulse gradually emerges after the first few tracks, it's not until over 20 minutes in --partway through Agoria's genially shuffling "For One Hour" -- that we get anything which could be properly called a beat, and (strangely for a so-called "live" set) a full 45 before the overarching moody languor fully gives way to dancefloor release. Don't think of it as merely an extended build-up though, but as a necessary and integral part of the journey: Ursula Bogner's embryonic dabblings, Barnt's kosmische clusters, Dominique's languid, drifting lounge noodles, and Hauschka's elegant, prepared-piano fantasia calmly giving way to Scalde's soulful-operatic wailing, Hatikvah's dubbed-out rumination, and the slow-moving, gently epic majesty of star-studded Kraut-techno supergroup Cologne Tape's "Render 2." All that brooding and spaciousness make the final emergence of a full-on house groove, in a bespoke edit of Mark E's warmly uplifting "Call Me" (featuring yet another spoken vocal, an interpolation of "Ain't No Mountain High Enough") all the more magical, priming us for the thumping disco jack and percolating synths of Roman Flugel's "Dishes and Wishes" and (after one last dip into moody, melancholic murk with Bruno Gauthier's darkly dubby "Existing Reality") the peerless, purely pleasure-inducing finale of Osunlade's fiercely funky deep-soul cut "Envision" (in a Dixon edit of Ame's remix), and Todd Terje's joyous, synth-dappled anthem "Snooze 4 Love." It's a shame the party has to end so soon, but such is life; with Live, Dixon leaves us fully living it and beckoning us to do the same. ~ K. Ross Hoffman