MOBY (VOODOO CHILD) – “Baby Monkey”

People don’t do it like this. They don’t just release an album with no publicity, no interviews, under a secret name, with only two mentions of who they really are on the whole thing. And then slip it quietly into the stores.

So “Baby Monkey”, the second album in an erratic series of releases by Moby under the moniker of Voodoo Child. Back in the early 90’s, when Moby was the only guy signed to the Instinct label, he did stuff like this all the time. He recorded under dozens of names – Brainstorm, Barracuda, Voodoo Child, DJ Cake, Lopez, UHF – to enable the label to constantly plug the NY stores with 12”s. These days he does stuff like this because he wants to.

A record of simple, straightforward, late night dance music, designed for dark crowded rooms, with big, stabbing strings, rhythms that compel you, and complex, intriguing structures. “Baby Monkey” is the polar opposite of it’s predecessor (1996’s ““The End Of Everything”” album), but the direct descendent of all his other Voodoo Child releases, dark, inhuman obsidian shapes. It’s the same template the first Voodoo Child records were, obscure, relentless, pounding. Simple, stark. And they didn’t sound like they were made by human beings – but records that are some form of mathematical code to be unlocked.

“Baby Monkey” is not the work of genius that ““The End Of Everything”” is. It’s harder, baser, more gutteral. Heading straight for the legs and the feet, not for the heart and soul. The type of music that people who don’t go out think that people who do go out should listen to. And it all sounds like one song – one long, brilliant song, but one song nonetheless, a tone poem if you like, the type of songs that Moby splices into his b-sides. “Baby Monkey” is the sound of someone making music purely for themselves, purely out of a love of music. And that’s how the best music is made.