This is the second time I've posted about a new release from Bristol's heavily Teutonic-influenced techno and house impresario in almost as many weeks; he is destroying it at the moment. On his EP for Skudge's recently-minted sub-label, Skudge Presents, the A side, 'Push', bangs it out like a construction site, all jackhammer percussion and nasty synths, with samples that sound like a very confused man trapped inside a drum machine. Chemical badness. 'Empire of Man', on the flip, exerts a less violent impact upon the dancefloor, but [...]
PhOtOmachine graced our pages many months ago when he featured as curator of one episode in our Bass Music Blog mix series; since then his style has altered drastically, and he has resurfaced making some deliciously raw and gritty yet stylish beats. Check out his forthcoming EP, about to drop on the highly-regarded house label 2020 Vision, complete with a remix from man of the moment, Funkineven: So yeah a good time to plug my night I guess, this Friday in the most eccentric and unfeasibly tiny club space Bristol has to [...]
Check what I just found. A series of posters that show you how to program some classic 808 beats AND make your studio wall look fancy at the same time. Browse the range and order an A3 print from this website here. Anyway, let's have some music. This is what I'm listening to right now, and it's perfect for this summery weather we're having out there; 157 minutes of disco, house, synths and soul, recorded live by Pete Herbert and Toby Tobias. It popped up on the Cosmic [...]
Julian Smith's new EP has just dropped on Will Saul's label, Simple (apparently brought back into business after hearing these tracks). Featuring his studio pal Borai, 'String Theory' itself is one of my favourite house bits of the year so far. Smith, as always, manages to do a great deal with very little; a modest staccato bassline underpins the gradual layering of drum parts and meandering pads (not to mention the nearby cries of a bird of prey), but increasingly seems to bounce elastically with all the impossible-to-hold-back enthusiasm of a teenager at Sankey's in the 90s. It is the [...]
Emptyset have been busy in the last 12 months making a name for themselves via the medium of art-inflected techno; gracing both the record boxes of people like Chris Liebing, and more contemplative situations such as their 'industrial classical' gigs in churches in Bristol. For this release they took their gear to a derelict gothic mansion, mic'd it up, and proceeded to flood the place with noise to see what happens. The natural reverb that results on this definitely lends the sounds an interesting extra feel, compared to their earlier stuff. [...]
On a good day for promos, I found myself marvelling how much of this music malarkey is based around luck. On the nearfield monitors chez Panhead Studios, which reward the brave (and scorn the timid), this little promo might well have passed me by. Bit polite maybe. But since I was listening on the headphones I got in exchange for my air miles the other year, I found myself quite entranced by the waves of synth work, the rolling textures, the depth of the subs, and the way that all this was layered over beats that are [...]
We're unashamed fans of Dark Sky here - operating within the confines of the dubstep/garage/future/bass realms, they consistently manage to cram enough ideas into their sound to remain ahead of the pack, and stay away from the standard soundalikes too. So it was with pleasure that I copped their latest promo, 'Black Rainbows' - due out on March 26th via Black Acre Records. It's a four track affair, on a double pack vinyl if you're of the purist's persuasion, and once again it stretches the boundaries of the garage crossover region expertly. The tracks that [...]
Just as the Yangtze mixes the silty with the clean in the above picture of Chongqing, so Behling & Simpson continue to combine the slow with the tough on a couple of recently released free downloads, all weighing in below the magic benchmark of 115bpm... First up, 2020Vision gave away the Behling & Simpson remix of Crazy P 's anthemic 'Changes': And secondly, as part of last week's Future Boogie Takeover , Notion Magazine gave away [...]
Not much to say about this, but if you have any interest in the roots of UK dance music, you should watch this. Proper. (In slightly more detail - the 90s Bristol DnB sound defined so much of what I like about dance music - sub bass, great drums, energetic without relying on the most obvious signifiers, and with a strong link to dub / soundsystem vibes) === Binga [...]
I've bigged up Eomac on here before, and he recently sent me a link to his new EP - great mix of lo-fi but detailed sound design with classically strong arrangements, and a distinct aesthetic - something I've blathered on about before as being of supreme importance. [...]
The very talented Kamal Joory has indulged in an unusually visible burst of creative activity for the past week and a half, uploading a new tune clip to his Soundcloud page every day. There's a wealth of ideas on display here, including tempos all over the shop, a Brackles collaboration, and a rip of a new Geiom banger played by Skream on his radio show recently, dig in: This way to the sounds: http://soundcloud.com/geiom ---- Gwyn [...]
If anyone likes looking at pictures of big ugly futurist concrete lumps totally pwning/ruining their surroundings then you could do a lot worse than checking out this blog . If anyone likes listening to big ugly futurist DJ mixes then check out some of these. Here's D-Bridge on RinseFM this week; I hear that his club sets these days feature plenty of tunes at the leisurely speed of 160BPM. Must catch him again sometime soon. This is across the board goodness however, including dubstep, melodic downtempo synthsoul and straight up [...]
Haven't reviewed a sample pack on here in a while. I've still been grabbing the odd one or two though, and this one really stood out. Put together by DnB producer Lynx, it's titled 'Eclectic Drum & Bass' - bit of a shame that this kind of thing is now 'eclectic' since really it just seems to mean 'not the obvious shit'. If you're familiar with his productions then you'll know Lynx writes clean, crisp, innovative DnB steppers that steer clear of sterile techstep, and this sample pack is a great reflection [...]
Our old pal, the remarkably prolific Antoni Maiovvi (check the Bass Music Mix link down the left) has yet another new project on the go. He's teamed up with fellow disco producer Gianni Vercetti to start a label for their blend of 'Horror Disco' - a sound which, as you may surmise, sounds like a disco soundtrack to an obscure early 80's Italian horror film. If you're into John Carpenter, moody Italo Disco and grainy VHS footage, read on. So anyway, this new label hit an early stumbling block when they realised [...]
Friday sees a massive booking from the ever-dependable Crazy Legs crew - men of the moment Objekt, Gerry Read and, fresh from cutting plates for his upcoming Fabric CD (yep, a house DJ that still cuts), the mighty Levon Vincent, all the way from the US of A - Indiana, to be precise. Listen to the above, which I first heard on his excellent Resident Advisor mix , and become excitable. And of course, Objekt n all: [...]
....in which DJ Pinch continues his 2012 push for world domination by following up his FabricLive CD with a collaboration with jungle legend Photek (the a-side is featured on the said CD, in fact). This is going to be out next week on Photek's own label; it's going to be huge no doubt, although my vote goes to the B-side - the title tracks steps over the line marked 'creeping dread' and all the way over to 'overt doom'. Bombastic stuff, but the flip keeps things a little more in check with a rolling house groove. [...]
Quick post here, gotta jump on a train to Nottingham in a minute. But cop a couple of these mixes anyhow. First, try the latest FACT mix by DJ Mike Q. It's a mix of Ballroom beats; another US-based micro-genre of dance music which seems to have existed largely self contained for a couple of decades now. Read up about the scene here . Check out Mike Q's reductive, minimalistic house beats at the link below (Fact don't allow embedding). It's great. http://soundcloud.com/factmag/ fact-mix-318-mikeq-feb-12/s-xL 5UD [...]
Quick post to let you know about this free track by Arp101, who's been making some serious waves lately. This one's to promote the forthcoming Eglo birthday party at Fabric, featuring Floating Points, Arp101 himself, Funkineven and more next thursday (click here for more details) . Anyway, the tune itself is wicked, probably my favourite of his stuff so far. Keeping the tempo down in the swarthy realms of a hundred or so BPM, this one splits the difference neatly between boogie, disco, and wonky hiphop, to create a loping groove that keeps [...]
Minimal bass music anyone? Been listening to this lately - it's by Δkkord (yep, notice the triangle) and if nothing else this is a textbook example of how to launch a project. Fortunately it's also musically very good. A very tightly realised concept that verges on the pretentious (the press release mentions their interest in 'sacred geometry'), but is done so well I can't complain, Δkkord is a design and music project by two dudes from Manchester. The music sits somewhere between minimal techno and 2004-era dubstep IMO, with a nod to the Autonomic DnB [...]
One of the skills that I know I don't have any great mastery of is sampling. I mean, obviously, I sample stuff, and I chop drums up, and I'll take a vocal here and there and so forth, but the kind of sampling that goes through 10 records, takes tiny melodic phrases out of each one, chops them, and makes them work together - that I'm not so hot at. Anyway the people over at egotripland have got in touch with some heavyweight producers (we're talking DJ Spinna, Large Professor etc.) and asked them to list [...]
bass music.
Boards of Canada – Reach For The Dead
HAERTS: “All The Days”
Sexy Track // “Devil Or Angel” // Lou Doillon
Daft Punk - Lose Yourself to Dance (Simøne Remix)
DANCE BITCH DANCE: disclosure - when a fire starts to burn
