the third release for la freund recordings comes from amsterdam resident beraber. consisting of four strong and diverse tracks and a jazzy, piano-heavy remix by chicago house legend vincent floyd, sun ritual works just as well in the club as it does at home. after working on hiphop and downtempo electronica under different aliases, this ep sees baris akardere venturing into up-tempo territories, marking the debut of his beraber moniker. all tracks were written and produced during the last two years, combining digital instruments like the korg m1 and yamaha dx7 with analog gear like the roland juno-6 and korg ms-10. kicking things off on the a-side is title track sun ritual, a positive and warm tune with lush chords and arpeggiated synths. after a surprising outro, it gets the remix treatment by deep house pioneer vincent floyd, who adds multiple layers to it and delivers a stunning, dreamy eight-minute take on the original. the flipside opens with ugly, a soulful club workout with a deep bassline, rolling drums with crisp hi-hats and a hypnotic melody. next up is introspect, a serious electro-tinged cut with heavy juno chords building up tension as the track evolves. rounding it up nicely, forest rain treats us to an intimate broken-beat affair laced with rhodes chords and field recordings from bali.
