Tracks of the Day: Ben Benjamin, 'Hirsute Airports,' 'Mentors of Temperature,' (2009, Ghostly International, from the EP The Many Moods of Ben Benjamin, Vol. 1.5)

Ben Benjamin has spent more than a decade composing electronica that consists of a subtle collage of beats, bleeps, bloops, blips, ambient clips, orchestral soundscapes, and the occasional vocal interlude, both as a founding member of the short-lived Michigan trio Midwest Product (then using his given name, Ben Mullins), and as his solo identity for the past 6 years or so.

He's released 2 LP's and 1 EP of material as Ben Benjamin from 2007-11, and I've chosen two tracks from his 2009 EP 'The Many Moods of Ben Benjamin, Volume 1.5,' which rank among his grooviest and most accessible. And yes, they do convey some distinct moods.

'Hirsute Airports' expresses in its somewhat esoteric title how excessively 'hairy' life spent in airports (in undesirable locales) can be, in all literal and figurative senses, I suppose. It also just so happens that, most appropriately, I first heard Ben Benjamin (more specifically, The Many Moods of Ben Benjamin, Volume 1) for the first time on an airplane, none other than on the hipster bastion Virgin Atlantic (Jet Blue is the other), while playing around with their rather extensive in-flight touch screen entertainment system. The groove in Hirsute Airports features pulsating electronic basslines, funky guitar riffs, breathy, reverberating orchestral passages, electric handclap percussion, and the relatively rare occurrence of a Ben Benjamin vocal. Definitely a driving, swaying, head-bobbing kinda song, and with a sunny, wry disposition enhanced by such lyrical passages as:

'Had to take a detour to a part of the country
That I realized I could do without
While awake, While I wait for the planes, 
Songs play overhead
And It's impossible to do without...'

1. Hirsute Airports


The second track, 'Mentors of Temperature,' has a vibe that borders on house-club-technotronica, with a loping groove that kinda infects the brain like a benevolent malaria...hehe, that's what comes to mind! It builds and convulses in short bursts of hot and cold electronica elements, from glossy, panoramic orchestral elements that recall an Arctic/Antarctic expanse, an infectious, hypnotic droning facsimile of a 'down periscope' sonar sound that appears in the opening third of the song, and mechanical, hot steam releases of percolating percussion, bass, synth outbursts, and guitar stabs. As the song settles in, it is backed by a building, high-pitched oompa loompa chant that gives me a syncopated visual of those crouching alien Space Invaders!

Ben Benjamin and your many moods, I don't mind being infected by your Mentors of Temperature if they're little space creatures from one of my favorite classic video games!

2. Mentors of Temperature