Album Review: Belief System by Special Request

Paul Woolford started Special Request as a way to channel his childhood love affair with pirate radio. Over time, the layers of nostalgia have fused with something more modern and stylish. That much was clear when I saw Woolford DJ as Special Request at this year's Bass Coast festival, where he threw down bass-heavy music of all stripes, venturing outside the hardcore and jungle domain of the earliest Special Request records.

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Paul Woolford found prominence in 2013 under the alias Special Request with his critically acclaimed by criminally underheard debut LP, Soul Music. Peddling a brand of sleek electronic music that draws heavily from early '90s U.K. rave and Detroit techno scenes, Woolford, now in his early 40s, can hardly be labelled a throwback artist, as the Leeds artist experienced these scenes firsthand.   Belief System, collects a whopping 23 songs into its hour and 40 minute runtime, going back to material Woolford composed as early as 1993. It could ….

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Four years ago, Paul Woolford painted himself into a corner. Under one of his many aliases, Special Request, the British producer released a striking debut album that captured the golden age of UK pirate radio and rave culture as though preserving it in amber. Soul Music pilfered the drum breaks, bass weight, and manic energy of jungle wholesale, folding each component into new yet strangely familiar shapes.

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Born from the desire to create rougher, harder tracks inspired by '90s rave, Paul Woolford's productions under his Special Request alias rarely fail to deliver on his premise. Having broken through the club-space with his 2013 VIP of Tessela's 'Hackney Parrot' and its gargantuan bassline, Woolford returns with his second LP, 'Belief System', released on Fabric's Houndstooth imprint. A marathon 23 tracks composed over three years, the record is one of two halves.

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