MOBY - Last Night

After three albums that seemed to find Moby in some sort of creative stasis, Last Night sees the once-restless DJ/producer changing the record and returning to one of his first loves: the heaving dancefloors of his native New York. Soulful, uplifting piano rave is the order of the day here, and while some hallmarks of Play remain--Moby still has a fascination for long, tearful synth lines and sampled vocals, which he drops in here and there, seemingly to yield the maximum emotional response--Last Night still feels like a clean slate. "I Like to Move in Here" shimmies along on a languid house beat that doffs a cap to early hip-hop in the shape of a cameo from MC Grandmaster Caz, one of the writers of "Rapper's Delight", while "Everyday It's 1989" is the sort of overdriven, ecstatic piano house that Moby perfected on his 1995 classic Everything Is Wrong. There's more guest spots in the shape of British MC Aynzli, the Nigerian 419 Squad and Sylvia from dark NYC disco band Kudu, but the most impressive thing about Last Night is the peaks that Moby can reach when he's working alone: see the grand, emotive swell of "Sweet Apocalypse", cold synths and driving beats that, were it released by James Murphy, would be hailed as genius--and rightfully, too.--Louis Pattison