Since debuting on Opal Tapes back in 2013 with Body Issues, Max Ravitz has been consistently prolific under a number of guises in a plethora of places. With his primary focus as Patricia, the Chicago-born, Brooklyn-based producer has delivered an album and supporting EPs to Spectral Sound, as well as additional transmissions for Sleeperhold Publications, Nona Records and other compilation drops. Meanwhile, he’s formed Black Mold with Lumigraph, DSR.MR with Cloudface, Inhalants with Jahiliyya Fields, Masks with ARP and Pulpo with Bookworms. These collaborations with equally celebrated practitioners spell out the furtive corner of contemporary techno Ravitz orbits, where hardware classicism gets channeled towards new plains of atmospheric expression. As well worn as the tools undoubtedly are, the results are consistently compelling.

On this new EP for Black Opal, Ravitz presents four distinct tracks that further establish his gift for evocative techno loaded with feeling and cloaked in the seductive haze of a grainy signal chain. “Heavy Merge” already feels emotionally weighted as it swoons with the lilting pitch of its pads and the fuzzy bite of a 303, but then “Balance Acid” pushes its own billowing veil of tape-warped melody further up in the mix for a particularly dewy-eyed excursion.

In contrast to the grounded, humanistic verve of the A side, “No One Needs Nothing” has a sense of futurism that aims skywards, even with the same ingredients of dusty acid lines, woozy synths and frosty drums powering the sound. “Too Many Takes” runs with this theme, strapping the sonics to an electro framework and fusing dubwise spatial awareness with a limber dance metre led by the blip of the Roland bassline generator.