The cheeky Germanic production duo of Gernot Bronsert and Sebastian Szary return to disturb subwoofers with Monkeytown, the first Modelselektor album on their own label and their last since the much ado’ed 2007 outing Happy Birthday.

Neither the type to idle nor to take themselves seriously, the pair have an abundance of excuses for their prolonged interim: releasing and touring as Moderat (a renewal of their triad with Sascha ‘Apparat’ Ring), cultivating their nascent label (and single-minded sublabel 50 Weapons), and remaining in the high esteem of Thom Yorke (managing to re-up the Radiohead frontman for not one, but two tracks this time around).

Monkeytown is the fruition of one marathon studio session over the span of ten weeks, the conclusion of which was proclaimed with much elation by way of a characteristically impish youtube missive. Devotees will be pleased with the result, as with this release Modeselektor further cement their status amongst the few electronic producers who can lay claim to a definitive sound, delivering on an album that more often than not achieves results greater than the sum of their respective parts.

Like its predecessor, their latest is a mixed affair of instrumentals and collaborations, peppered with a list of known associates, including lounge lyricist Busdriver (waxing wonderfully faux-sensical with Pillow Talk on ‘Pretentious Friends’), label-mate and fellow synth mentalist Siriusmo, and a slightly-more-tolerable Otto von Schirach (playing the role of enabler on ‘Evil Twin’).

Distilled down to a tidy eleven tracks and clocking in at just over 55 minutes, the production on Monkeytown is their best to date, offering languid, syrupy low ends (best exemplified on the standout Miss Platnum collab ‘Berlin’) and showcasing the duo’s ability to weave tracks that achieve full symbiosis with their contributing vocals.

Interestingly, Yorke’s double-down proves to be somewhat of a wash, as accommodating his imposing presence twice over the span of a long player was bound to bring some turbulence to the flow – ‘Shipwreck,’ while quite palatable in isolation, tends to be discombobulating when wedged between a wicked slab of dancefloor demonism and ‘30 asian chicks with herniated disks eating turkey bacon bits.’

The ride is much smoother thereafter, buoyed by a pair of instrumental club soundsystem bangers (‘German Clap’, ‘Grillwalker’) and later in, the roundly superior ‘This.’ The pair’s ambition sees them occasionally veer into saccharine territory (see the pop scaffolding on ‘Green Light Go’) but pays handsome dividends in the homestretch, capped by the excellent ‘War Cry,’ which closes the album with a grandiosity once the exclusive domain of Massive Attack.

With Monkeytown, Modeselektor impart a gust of fresh autumn air through bass, techno, hip-house and other scenes-du-jour, and trying to pin down the simian heavyweights in 2011 is tantamount to chasing the wind.