Pantha Du Prince: Black Noise

Label: Rough Trade

The slyly named Pantha Du Prince is German techno producer Hendrick Weber, who in his eight or so years of action (mostly confined to the Eurocentric electronic-music world) has dropped a couple of well-liked (if niche-noticed) albums along with a small handful of singles. Black Noise is his coming-out party both Stateside and in the less techno-exclusive indie world (note the Rough Trade logo on the back), and it’s already rippling across scene boundaries. Credit Weber’s style: clean and crisp but utterly approachable and warm, with a mind for techno-adornment that’s garnered appropriate mentions of both the best first-wave shoegazers and the Detroit/Berlin techno axis of rhythmic power. “Stick to My Side” features a winning vocal from Noah “Panda Bear” Lennox, making for the most obvious bridge between Weber’s techno provenance and the indie scene he’s now being exposed to, but his textural brilliance is even more apparent on “The Splendour,” with melodic curlicues swimming between beats, and “Bohemian Forest,” which suggests a low-key version of Thomas Brinkmann’s funky-tech excursions. Black Noise is an hour-plus of full-color techno, deep grooves that are safe for the groove-challenged. (Vinyl contains digital download code.) (M.L. Thrope)