[Komfort.Labor]

This could be a big post, I'll try to keep it short.
A listening project going on for several years on Saturday nights at (now defunkt?) Berlin's WMF Club, of which sadly I had neither personal experience of nor many info anyway, Komfort.Labor passed in history when they documented their efforts in three mixed CD compilations through the remarkably potent WMF Records.(*)
The first part is mixed by Stefan Betke aka Pole, and it's more or less a presentation of the just established ~scape 'style', a mix of dub, clicks, some jazz and few beats. Betke is trying a few new things here, showing his tendencies to explore dub hop and jazz territory in the future (as he did, actually), mostly though it's hisses and cracks and bass, just as you'd expect anyway. Usual suspects include Atom, Friedman, Vladislav Delay, Kit Clayton, Jan Jelinek as Farben, etc.
Second CD is mixed by master Thomas Fehlmann (respect!) and always enchanting Gudrun Gut of Monika Enterprise and Malaria! fame, as (leading) members of the Ocean Club. Musically it's the most interesting of the three, as it constantly shifts between genres and styles without letting the listener's interest down. '80s blend with Cologne techno, Berlin dub with Arto Lindsay, diversity is the word here, possibly emulating their radio show adapted to the club era. The Berlin-Cologne axis stands strong and all tracks are strategically selected to please everyone while teaching some history.
The third and final compilation is in collaboration with Native-Instruments (see Reaktor, Kontakt, Absynth, etc.), that showcases half of the Mille Plateaux posse and some more artists manipulating their own material with Reaktor and achieving the kind of sound that later on would dominate clubs as well as headphones. Once again, concept overcomes art and to my ears it sounds like the weak link in the WMF discography, still you'll find interesting times and some clicking tech mixes in here. For glitch fans it may be awesome. Included was a ~3MB data track, an interface to manipulate a Lazyfish track. I'll post it anyway just in case it works for someone (never did for me).



VA - 2001, [Komfort.Labor] presents ~scape
Part 1 - Part 2
Info here.


VA - 2001, [Komfort.Labor] presents Ocean Club
Here.
Info here.


VA - 2002, [Komfort.Labor] presents Native Lab
Part 1 - Part 2 - Data.
Info here.

(*) WMF comes from 'Wuertembergische MetallwarenFabrik'. The label published all kinds of quality goodies, all highly recommended, with Kotai's 'Sucker DJ' being their biggest club hit.
Highfish (who did the stunning remix) has also participated in the Engel remix of Colder's 'To The Music', which in my opinion is the best thing that ever came out of the Output vaults along with DK7's 'The Difference'. He's also a bass player and a totally cool DJ, that effortlessly cleared all other stages and filled his own full in 15 minutes while in Sonar just by playing good music for the people. We need a few more guys like him, I'd say.