Also this issue: Random House The Twin Atlas’ curious methods and haphazard road map to rock. -Brian Howard The Nut Never Sleeps -Sam Adams Melt Banana -Paul Burress Alexi Murdoch -Nicole Pensiero Tom Tom Club -A.D. Amorosi DJ Buck -Sean O’Neal Mary Lee's Corvette -Nicole Pensiero Yerba Buena -A.D. Amorosi

July 10-16, 2003

musicpicks

Chris Liebing

After rockin' the decks for over 10 years, Frankfurt's Chris Liebing is now Germany's most admired techno DJ. His sound is hard, driving, minimal and groovy -- so precise and fine-tuned that you're better off switching into a near-mesmerized state of being so your mind and ears stick to each subliminal tidbit of the mechanical, slowly morphing rhythms. The techno impresario has a seemingly infinite plentitude of 12-inch releases on labels like Geushky, Primate, Molecular, Harthouse (as Traveller) and his own CL Recordings. All this time, Liebing perceived his own tracky music and other techno 12-inches as nothing more than "dance-floor oriented." Still he asserts that a full-length album, on the other hand, requires an idea and certain concept behind it. But how can a collection of such loopy, repetitive music geared for DJs emit a collective theme that goes deeper than the danceability of each tune? Evolution (CLR), Liebing's debut full-length, is over 70 minutes of continuous driving techno that induces pondering about the evolution of mankind (inspired by the theories of Stephen Hawking) as well as of Liebing's own musical metamorphosis. But the theme is deep down and you have to listen carefully in order to make your own discoveries.

Wed. July 16, 10 p.m.-2 a.m., $10, with Donato, Jamie Morris and G-Drive, Fluid, 613 S. Fourth St., 215-629-0565.

—Sean O’Neal