The Radio edit version of this song is available for FREE download as mp3 from the F-Com homepage
http://www.fcom.fr/ez/index.php/en/ Bottom right hand corner box, marked with a gold star.
I have struggled to find ANY reviews of this online, so I have put together one of my own.
Not quite the style you might be getting familiar with, but I hope it summarises the single objectively and gives a general idea of what its all about.
More peppermint than petrol"Never Been Here Before" is the second single by leading Finland DJ Jori Hulkkonen to be written for and feature guest vocals by John Foxx.
Taken from Hulkkonen's forthcoming album
Errare Machinale Est, this new single is quite different from the first collaboration, 2005's
Dislocated, which could have easily passed for a track written by Foxx himself and lost in the post for twenty five year on its way to Scandinavia for mixing and production.
NBHB is piano-led, dance based techno, soft and deep, with tender vocals from Foxx treated with vocoder and much gentleness, carried along with that spray-can hiss familiar to fans of Crash and Burn and interrupted with exactly the right amount of bleeps and ARP(??) notes. The track (at least the radio edit) is quietly filmic and has enormous potential for both the dancefloor and a tv ad - it will be interesting to hear the full version when the album is released in a couple of weeks.
In the meantime, and as per Dislocated, there are four remixes of the song available, featuring some of Northern Europe's most eminent DJs including Sasse (aka Klas Lindbad, the Green Man, Morris Brown, Must! etc) the owner Moodmusic Records, who currently has two residencies in Berlin specialising in luscious house vibes and funky, deep techno; and Jeff Benett, celebrated producer of The Youngsters (who themselves remixed a version of Dislocated) and best known for skill with melodies and minimalism.
Benett's remix of NBHB carries the EP, and is certainly the strongest of the four versions. Hulkkonen's own 'dub' opener is a mellow and hypnotic instrumental, while Sasse's 'dub' which follows is a little more clinical and upbeat, reminsicent of Lee Norris (aka
Metamatics, with whom Foxx fans will already be familiar. It is these two tracks that feature on the only available hard copy, a 12" vinyl single. This will disappoint Foxx fans in particular as he is virtually absent from both, and compared with the other two mixes these are furthest removed from his characteristic sound. The echoing, softly delivered chorus drifts in and out of one or the other, but neither is particularly inspiring.
Benett's remix (track 3) involves a radical treatment of the whole vocal track that makes Foxx sound female in a way that works surprisingly well. It's the most adventurous dance-oriented version and the only one that I felt wasn't quite long enough.
Sasse's second attempt is crisp, clean and closest to the radio version, giving the EP tighter and more defined edges than the others. There are those that will argue this goes on rather too long, but for late night/early morning Sunday clubbers this deep, minimalist chill out would be the perfect tonic.
To be honest, I suspect most Foxx fans will buy this out of loyalty and completeness rather than the must-have passion that drives the lust for new material. It is after all incidental to his current projects rather than the harbinger of a change in direction.
There is more peppermint than petrol in NBHB, and it is more Jori and less John than
Dislocated. In that regard it is quite a departure from what we are used to and perhaps is more significant for its origin and for what it represents than for what it ultimately sounds like.
There is a lot of wonderful electronic music and some of the best DJs in Europe coming out of Finland at the moment, and Hulkkonen is at the forefront. If he can bring a new audience to the work of John Foxx then we will be all the better for it. Works both ways of course - John doesn't do this kind of work with anyone else and has a mutual admiration for and belief in Jori Hulkkonen. And it does underline once again how much respect there is underground for Foxx and how vast his influence truly is.
