[Ann Aimee]

One of the great things about electronic music is that it constantly allows new producers the opportunity to shine. Despite the increasingly high volumes of music released, it is still possible — arguably the high proportion of substandard work makes it even easier to get noticed nowadays, but that warrants another piece, hell, even a thesis — for talent to get noticed. Before last year, Niels Luinenberg couldn’t get arrested, but after two after two releases in 2008, the deep dubbed out “Electromagnetic Radiation Part 1” and the sinister and more satisfying “Silhouette” for Ann Aimee, the latest release under the Delta Funktionen pseudonym is eagerly awaited.

It sounds like Luinenberg has taken stock of his approach and consequently, the second installment is divided between two different approaches. “Dawn” gets the release off to a sluggish start, with Niels taking time to gradually introduce dreamy, ethereal chords over a resonating, chugging groove. “Deflection” ups the ante with slivers of metallic percussion adding some urgency to a similarly dense chord sequence. “Intruder” marks a change of tact and does so in a spectacularly understated fashion; stripping away the musical elements that had prevailed, the focus shifts to a moody bass line, sinister claps and an intangible eeriness thats not entirely dissimilar to the mood classic Suburban Knight evokes. “Pretermission” maintains this course, with Luinenberg navigating his way through a stripped back rhythm track populated only by a resonating bass and a positively gloomy interpretation of “intelligent” techno’s melodic sensibilities. This understated duality shows that Luinenberg’s sound continues to develop — from the listener’s perspective it’s sure to keep us guessing about what surprises the third “Electromagnetic” installment will bring.