Contact

After finally getting back to straight-ahead dancefloor techno with Fusion, Sven Väth upped the ante with Contact, an LP filled with track after track of driving electro and hard Detroit techno — by way of Berlin. Instead of longtime co-producer Ralf Hildenbeutel, Väth tapped Anthony Rother, Johannes Heil, and Alter Ego's Roman Flügel and Jörn Wuttke as production partners. The move gives Contact a breadth of sound unequaled by his previous material; Rother contributes some excellent chunky analogue synth to "Pathfinder" and "Ydolem," while on "Ein Waggon Voller Geschichten," Flügel and Wuttke apply the detuned and slightly distorted effect most famous from Mr. Oizo's "Flat Beat." The other big difference from Väth's first three LPs is that half of these tracks have vocals, and they're all by Väth himself. Surprisingly, these work pretty well, with the man simply vamping over the beats and then heavily processing his vocals afterwards. After so much serious, disappointing music in Väth's career, it's a refreshing change to hear dance music with a bit of humor to it.