- Jacques Renault not only tops the Phonica charts, but was also named Paper Magazine's Best NYC DJ (in addition to getting in the mix as one of the magazine's Beautiful People for 2007). And if the imminent release of his debut on DFA (as Runaway) weren't enough, he now drops this EP for Philly's punk-rooted disco-edit label, RVNG, a three-tracker as dizzying as is to be expected from a cat already at such precipitous heights.
"When you smile, the world is smiling with you" goes the male and female voices on "Bad Skinned," as sleazy and deleterious (also optimistic and empowering) a disco cut as we've yet come upon (take that either way). Renault doesn't stop there, though, piling on an audacious mélange of tazers, tractor beams and warp speed generator sounds that evoke a late '70s West Village bathhouse turned into an early '80s Lazer Tag facility. (There's the same amount of steam and dry ice smoke in both).
No smoke and mirrors are needed for the straight-ahead "Sweet Rollin' On" which has tickled keys, three layers of clopped percussion and a tizzy of horns that could fool folks into thinking it's a Kool and the Gang instro. The side-long "Tuxedo Dance" is another epic edit of strings, black seraphic coos and porn-soundtrack guitar that again eschews tricks and Battlestar Galactica sound f/x. It ascends so smoothly than only when the needle's on the run-out groove (of more spaceship take-off sounds) do you realize you've gotten so high that you're up in outer space again.
TracklistA1 Bad Skinned
A2 Sweet Rollin' On
B1 Tuxedo Dance
B2 Bad Skin Effect