By Seth Webb

Released in 2011, Divergent Spectrum is Bassnectar's sixth studio album and achieved great success, reaching number six on itune’s top ten albums within ten hours of its release. This album, like most of the DJ’s work, is a dubstep album and is intended for listening purposes rather than dancing, which is not always the case when it comes to electronic music.

Out of the fifteen tracks on the album, three of them are remixes of songs done by author artists, Plugged In is a remix of a Rollz song, Immigraniada  is a Gogol Bordello song, and Lights is an Ellie Goulding song. This isn’t to say that its a form of piracy, far from it, Bassnectar makes these songs his own with the remixes, Immigraniada  was originally a punk rock song that has now been transformed into a clear candidate for electronica, and his remixes of Plugged In and Lights are two of the strongest tracks on the album.

The album does an amazing job at capturing this other worldly, almost science fiction feel to each of the tracks, from the different modulated bass lines, to the wide and vibrant synth chords, it justifies the use of electronics by making music that would be impossible on traditional instruments. The songs feel spacey, but not subdued, almost any of them could be used to help train for a marathon with their high intensity drum loops and risers. The album is truly an experience to be had, and is a rush from beginning to end. If you don’t have time to listen to it in its entirety or if you are new to the genre and unsure if it's something you'd like, then I would start by listening to the high marks.

Lights(Bassnectar Remix) is, as it sounds, a dubstep remix of the pop song Lights by Ellie Goulding. At the beginning, it starts off with the piano and Ellie Goulding’s vocals as normal, but in the background you hear the deep impact of a bass synth rising, it's subtle but noticeable. When the chorus starts though, more and more instruments are added one by one and they all build into a drop where the second verse would normally be and continues on from that point blending the pop and dubstep cultures together. Compared to the other tracks, this one is more relaxed and could be argued to be a pop song with strong dubstep elements and if I had to recommend a song to someone new to the genre I’d choose this one just because it does an amazing job at blending the two genres. It does such a good job, that when Lupe Fiasco sampled Lights for his song Lightwork, he sampled the Bassnectar remix rather than the original.

For fans of more percussive, almost hip-hop dubstep or drumstep, I’d recommend The Matrix and Voodoo, both of which rely heavily on intricate rhythmic patterns and synth in their composition. Both tracks also use simple vocals that are complete in the beginning, but later chopped up and added in as if they were instruments the same as a drum, adding to the glitch aesthetic. Where the songs differ mostly is in the style of their synth: The Matrix is mostly open and vocoded while  Voodoo uses saw and square waves to form its melodies.

If you like electronic music with a lot of layers and dense soundscapes, then Boomerang is the right track for you. This track is like a glacier, unlike the other tracks on this album, the melody moves and transitions slowly, but it does so with such a strong force that it doesn’t feel passive or laid back.

The first track, Upside Down, is a hypnotic journey and will be stuck in your head all day with its rising and collapsing melody. Truly living up to its name, this song builds it up and then turns it upside down.

Listening to Plugged In feels like going through a portal to another world with its driven fast melody and drum combo that grow until they collide into these short sprints of music.

 If you like Punk Rock, then Immigraniada is the one for you. Honestly at the beginning this song feels out of place due its rock nature, but given time the song morphs into a brilliant mix between two cultures and musical styles.

Admittedly the other tracks on this album are weaker, not really standing out on their own, some of them being too extreme of the genre. Though if you like really intense dubstep, I’d check out both Red Step and Paging Stereophonic.

If you enjoy this album I would recommend other Bassnectar albums such as Wildstyle and Noise vs. Beauty.