Bedrock

Unlike 1998's Atmospherics: Breaks, Chris Fortier's Bedrock is overweight, stuffy, full of dreary intention, and almost three hours long. By now Fortier was reacting to progressive's backlash from the wrong angle. Bedrock is more seamless than anything in his back catalog, more knowingly sealed off from the pulsing interests of the real world. As such, without an interior imagination to use it to his advantage, Fortier wastes away in a shut closet of Meat Katie's "My Little Dancing Girl," Kolo's "Nova," and a disappointingly hobbled double shake of Ben Camp's "Timewreck" and "Timecrash," which all grouse away with their cold, frustrating grooves and vacant vocals as if they were wedged into the mix like dirty laundry. Progressive breaks is a perilous business and Fortier had, from the evidence at hand, backed into a place that didn't allow him to cope anymore.