It’s been a long five years for Wolfgang Gartner.
Since his debut album Weekend In America five years ago, Wolfgang has been a figurehead in electronic music alongside the likes of other greats like MSTRKRFT. His inimitable talent and skill behind production led many to fall in love with his sound.
Unfortunately, his health got the better of him more than a year ago. Due to an undisclosed “cardiac trouble,” Gartner has been absent from touring for over a year. In his absence, we have seen a lot of different trends come and go, but Gartner has always been on our minds. 
“As I made this announcement for the album, I was really caught off guard,” he says. “The amount of people that responded and said ‘we can’t wait to have you back…’ I expected it to just fall through the cracks. I thought I’d been out of the loop so long, I expected it to just be over.”
The album, 10 Ways To Steal Home Plate, is Gartner’s shining re-entry to the world of electronic music, and it’s likely to take many people off guard. It is not the Gartner we once knew. This version is rather more experimental, fun, and carefree. The album title is extremely indicative of the album’s contents, something that only just occurred to me. The album is 10 tracks, and each one presents a different way to “steal home plate,” a metaphor for scoring a run in baseball. It means that nothing he’s doing is by the book, and he’s just doing whatever.
“I just did whatever the hell I wanted.”
For sure, the album presents a variety of styles from “funk to disco, electro, and big house bangers,” as Billboard puts it. The lack of consistency is a little jarring, but the consistent lack of consistency is something that ties this album together as only a producer like Wolfgang Gartner could accomplish.
Like I mentioned before, this album won’t be for everyone. However, it’s difficult to deny the quality of production on each track, in spite of how oddly some of them are put together.
Make up your own mind, and listen to the album exclusively on Spotify below. Purchase 10 Ways To Steal Home Plate here.
As an extra little bit of trivia, Wolfgang Gartner is quite the cat lover. During his hiatus, he was caring for his 17-year-old cat, Mr. Bigglesworth, who’d been diagnosed with cancer five years ago. Gartner even “read up on acupuncture massage and got really great at delivering kitty medications.”
