brawther – do it yourself on secretsundaze

criminally, i’ve never been to secretsundaze. despite that, though, whenever the name crops up a certain sound track begins to play in my head. it’s an unassuming one, a groovy one, and a subtly sexy one. listening to this (a first original release, and the first of any sort – ie mix cd – since 2008) tells me i’ve not been far wrong: i’d be lying if i said it was anything wholly new, but warm, well produced house will never sound tired.

‘do it yourself’ is to-the-point, where the point is to get caught up in a deep, chunky and tunnelling groove and stay there for, in this instance, six and half minutes. cutting through the sub-bloated throb are garage-derived wooden hits and masked female vocal inflections, both of which do little to distract you from the ongoing march, but both of which are important touches to bring the whole thing out of the speakers with a little extra dynamism: no nonsense business, to be sure.

contributing his second track, ‘spacerman funk’ young parisian brawther again harks back to less exhaustingly creative times (good thing), where an unaffected boom-bap, crafted on vintage gear and with suggestive sampling, was enough to get the job done. and frankly, when done as economically yet authentically as this (it’s aged with a lovely dusty crackle), it still is: pure, unadulterated deep house… no more, no less, it’s effortlessly cool.

after reading that, it should come as no surprise to learn that brathwer has been raised under the tutelage of chez damier; whilst traces of pepe bradock and kerri chandler are never that far away. it may surprise you, however, that george fitzgerald is on remix duty. breaking things down into restless, punchier kicks and rattling hits, you dive into deep, hotflush-styled bass territory that’s typically infused with a radiating glow of tonal warmth and refreshing airiness. evolutionary not revolutionary, the whole ep is solid as a rock.

buy it

published on May 16, 2011 9:26 am.
filed under: brawther, deep house, review, secretsundaze

pittsburgh track authority ~ the first four ep on uzuri

sure, everyone’s always on about the authentic and connoisseur imprints in detroit, amsterdam and berlin which are at the vanguard of the day’s house and techno scene, but london has them too you know.  uzuri is one such example, with the likes of cassy and anton zap defining their assured output to date.  it’s output that goes at its own pace, delves deeper than most and is built on a rich heritage of vintage d and c town sounds, but which also manages to look to the future. exactly fitting that mould is the triumvirate of american production talents that is pittsburgh track authority (featuring the vociferously vocal tom pipecock of the infinitestatemachine blog) who here turn in a sumptuously seductive selection of live and improvised sounding jams. the temptation is to label them retroistic, but that’s likely just down to the fact that you don’t often come across such considered underground music in the age of disposable digital production. 
‘duskshaped’ comes on with all the instrumental funk and soul of a josé james record: there are multiple key and bass lines which roll freely from start to finish, always with an unpredictable fluidity.  big claps and scuffy kicks power the track along, and you could as well be in the audience at a live jazz bar as you could be at home listening to a modern day house label: it’s classy stuff.  a little perkier, ‘verticalimpact’ certainly stands more upright than the opener, but trudges along on a squelchy and slo-mo acid line which crawls so immovably at its own lethargic pace that it inevitably has you yearning for it to go faster. but it never does.  in stubbornly holding back, there is a tension which keeps you locked because, as they say, the thrill of the catch is in the chase, and this is a looong chase.
imbued with a parrish-esque afro funk, next track ‘bloodlands’ again has itself stretched in all directions, with rippling chords dripping over a barely rotating sub bass and buried-in-the-mix percussion. contributing to the languorousness is a gently rising and falling male chanting somewhere off in the distance. the whole arrangement swells effortlessly forwards and backwards like a midnight wave breaking on a moonlit beach,  and it’s some of the most sensuous house you are likely to have heard in a long while.  ’77b’, meanwhile, taps a tantalisingly slow pace to start, with a muffled, flat bass pattern injecting a subtle sense of crescendo. of course, you’re forever riding on the crest father than falling down the other side, with cheeky, suggestive little chords brightening the whole simmering arrangement at various intervals. the selective placement of some swooning strings are the icing on the cake; the thing that have you boil over into emotive whimpers of ‘oooo yeah’, even though the track itself stays well and truly restrained.
all four efforts here are masterfully balanced – just enough to have that little something that makes you want to hear them all over again, but nowhere near too much as for anything to get lost or crowded out in the mix: every detail is important, every detail does a job; every detailed has clearly been fawned over and coming together they make for some of the most powerful and well appointed slow burners you could wish for. 
buy it

published on May 14, 2011 12:13 pm.
filed under: deep house, pittsburgh track authority, review, uzuri

various artists ~ ava. 001

this is an exciting release – it’s not only comprised of four great tracks, but it also announces the auspicious arrival of a brand new label from cologne, and a brand new production talent from the same electronic hotbed. damiano von erckert is that talent, and ava. is his label. read the imprint’s short bio and you instantly suspect it means business; listen to its first release and you know so.

the one solo contribution from von erckert is the highlight: ‘untitled emotion’ is a patient, unassuming record that builds through lo-humming bells and a churning mechanical groove. when the ‘bap’ is added to the kick’s ‘boom’, it’s firmed up into what could become tech house. but it doesn’t; it’s too bouncy for that. instead, it reveals itself to be a deep space jam once a digital blip bleeds into the mix, growing ever louder and rising like the sun of a new day. subtle synth tweaks, barely-there vocal patches and an ethereal veil flesh out the rawness into something far more powerful overall than its subtle parts would suggest. restrained and delightful, it out-shines murat tepeli’s more stagnant remix for the way it pushes so effortlessly forward.

‘symphonie of a brother’ sees von eckert team up with funkycan for a simmering, less introverted house workout that instead looks outward with its muted string samples and cutesy key lines. importantly, the instrumentation feels reel rather than affected, making for another refreshing addition to anyone’s record bag. pampa man christopher rau closes this first release with a skittish percussive number all antsy with the gasps of voices and claps but bathed in an inviting warmth. it’s a patchwork of sounds that add up to a tight, groovy number almost befitting of hessle audio or some other such kinetic stable.

watch out for an interview with label boss damiano tomorrow, as well as a podcast from him at the beginning of next week… clearly someone of a refined taste, it should make for excellent listening.

buy it

published on May 13, 2011 4:56 pm.
filed under: ava., christopher rau, damiano von erckert, house, review

midland – through motion ep on aus

18-odd months after first appearing on aus (albeit as a co-signatory alongside the artist formerly known as ramadanman) a lot has changed in midland’s world. where he was initially lumped in with the dubstep2.0 scene, a number of remixes, an ep and a fact mix have blown that association right out of the water. seemingly as free-roaming as bristol boy bashmore, the leeds loiterer has surfed on through breakbeats and garage in 2011, though always whilst maintaining an omnipresent house thread.
‘shelter’ is pure mood music, pregnant with an impending sense of doom that never quite manifests itself. mainly because of the roaming, moaning and groaning synth which pans endlessly across an apocalyptic, terminator-style landscape of smoking embers and charred debris.   cutting through the thick, dark ambiance, a woody and buoyant combination of drums and percussion try to outrun the searchlight-esque shadow cast by the synth, and that brings with it a finely crafted and unavoidably evocative tension.
‘through motion’ is the cautiously optimistic new light that would seep through following the cloudy events documented in ‘shelter’: opening with the initial stirrings of life (or what sound like knocks on wood and the rolling of marbles across a board) a beat quickly appears and pads out a melancholic pattern that hints at better days ahead. tonal echoes add colour, minor keys add emotion and eventually you’re allowed to let out some pent-up elation when a pitched-up female vocal cry comes as a welcome (though far from gratuitous) release: it makes for a beautifully heart warming moment.  two fulsome (in terms of sound design rather than load) productions, then, that operate in mature mental spheres a world away from most…. trus’ aus to bring the best out of someone. 
(ps:  if you buy it digitally – which you shouldn’t, ‘cos these here midland sounds are ripe for hearing through an authentic vinyl crackle – you get a bonus tevo howard remix.)

published on May 10, 2011 5:20 pm.
filed under: aus, house, midland, review

robag wruhme – thora vukk on pampa

every year, there are but a handful of albums (out of thousands) which strike a pose a couple of steps left of centre, where centre is the torrid flow of ‘variation-on-a-theme’ house or techno.  the reason there are only a couple is obvious… not everyone can do it. sure, being semi-decent on ableton may well mean you cough up a beatport chart topper or even a passable full length of dancefloor tracks every now and then, but it will only get you so far. it takes something else altogether to craft a truly unique record; to draw from a previously undefined sonic palette as did, say, john roberts or actress back in twenty ten. 
thankfully, 2011 already has a few candidates for this year’s ‘now this, is fressssh…’ crown (blake, jaar, morposis) but with thora vukk, ex wighnomy brother robag wruhme also throws his hat into the ring.  it’s an album composed of sounds that aren’t familiar, where often beats, percussion and melody come not from instruments  – real or synthesized -  but from the looped and effected sound of closing scissors, or the rattle of a dropped bottle top, or the knocking of wood, or the sharpening of  a knife.  barely separable ‘tracks’ bleed into each other via more found sounds, voices, sombre piano solos (on which, incredibly pleasingly, you can hear the player’s nostril whistle slightly as he breathes in and out; the keys moving and clunking making almost as much noise as the notes themselves and even the hitting of a few computer keys as the recording is stopped) to form a delicate, tender, sombre stream of conscious from beginning to end. 
the structure-less segues (which beautifully seep to the surface between the thick, druggy, villalobos-style minimal house tracks which form the backbone) grow more and more ominous as the album goes on, eventually sucking the whole thing down into a dark and reverberating hole of sonic darkness at the midpoint.  of course, you emerge once again, this time at the hands of a warbling bassline, hugely nostalgic strings and a distracted man’s museful hummings … like the album over all, it’s music that’s super animated, fascinatingly alive.
whilst it’s close-up detail is perfect for attentive headphone listening, thora vukk’s more conventionally structured, humid and grubby grooves will also likely sound mighty nice in some dark basement somewhere.  i’ve already extolled my love for pampa on this blog… consider it now an infatuation.
buy it

published on May 6, 2011 12:31 pm.
filed under: house, pampa records, review, robag whrume

prosumer – panorama bar 03 on ostgut ton

unless you’re a fair to middlin discogs bod, i reckon it would be pretty hard to date any given record on this mix. new ones, old ones and curveballs alike are all marbled with a classy detroit/chicago classicism that renders them all similarly aged and authentic sounding, regardless of their native era. it’s that interchangeableness between old and new that means pbar 03 is not a mix by numbers, but instead a timeless and tireless house workout that punches through a whole workshop full of gears. frankly (in the least shirt off, ‘oi-oi’ way possible) it’s banging…

vibrant and dynamic analogue sounds are an overriding aesthetic, with a thumping, four to the floor bolster omnipresent below. and that in itself is great, because far too often (presumably in fear of losing you to the monotony or forgetableness of their tunes) too many jocks tread water in ‘evocative’ downbeat puddles or kick their heels in noodly, a-groovy doodles when recording club mixes. prosumer, though, keeps you engaged by swiftly unravelling a different strain of house dna with each clipped progression. and there are 17 of them in all, so you’d better belt-up…

after the beautifully insular melancholy of steffi’s opener, ‘sadness’, an impulsive lick is immediately set with the free falling vibes of ‘heard’. from that point on, the mix planes with perfect poise, carving out firm groove after firm groove, momentarily resetting before charging off down another rich corridor of sound: instead of big breakdowns, it’s the quick, dj sneak-like mixing style which keeps you propped up throughout. raw beats, warm chords, kicking basslines…. each is just another dash of textured punctuation in the multifarious house conversation which prosumer so efficiently articulates overall.

one minute you’re going “whooo yeah” in ‘the house of god’, then you’re surfing carefree on a rolling rhythm before the next passage has you diving down to lock onto a deep, surging bassline. though decidedly discernible, the stylistic switch ups are also deft, with the tension between tracks resulting in an even more engaging ride. much like the cover suggests, then, a prosumer set offers many different views of the same underlying thing… house music; sweet, sweet house music.

buy it

published on April 29, 2011 4:58 pm.
filed under: chicago house, deep house, house, panormama bar, prosumer, review

subeena – wrong for me ep on opit

even when (if?) she was making dubstep in the past, subeena’s aesthetic was always a glassy, colour-rich and melodious one. whilst she indulges that kaleidoscopic take on sound yet further on this, her latest ep for opit, she also delves deeper in to the realms of house music (at least in terms of beat patterns). what’s great about this music is the way it sounds so real, as if played by humans, not programmed by robots or processed as 1 and 0s. there’s a breadth and depth to the productions, too, which hark of ability.

‘wrong for me’ opens things up with harmonic four-tet styled melodies before a lazy, broken beat loop looms deep and a granular vocal cuts through the otherwise detached, psychedelic sounds. the midpoint marks a tempo shift as synths begin to sing out intense, long held notes; a churning sub swells and swells and beats tumble into a canter: it makes for an elastic arrangement of sounds that all rise and fall together across an elongated horizontal plane, but only briefly, for the clam swiftly returns and the slow, underlying swell of the whole hypnagogic track comes back to the fore.

the long, darkly trance-y house of delsin types redshape or morphosis come to mind throughout best cut ‘space of flow’ for the way it pairs tinkling, hung melodies with snappy snares, elongated lines and fizzing, spiralling background fx. the whole dark march seems suspended in mid air with alien beams shooting through at random points and, again, an ocean-like swell subtly shifts the whole thing forward. it’s tense stuff, too, with a kick anxiously kicking the same pattern, without resolve, unlike the less tethered beats, taught synths and barely-shackled, early detroit electro vibes of ‘end of reason’. overall, classy shit.

buy it

published on April 16, 2011 11:14 am.
filed under: house, review, subeena

youandewan – youandme / zeal on disfigured dubz

it’s not hard to work out what this leeds based, on-the-brink producer has been listening to. but that’s not to say that’s all you can hear, because whilst his almost inverse arrangements (as if what should be dark is light, and vice versa) bare all the ghostly hallmarks of burial, they come with firmer beats and a more inherent sense of optimism in place of the aforementioned’s crushing isolation.

first cut ‘youandme (on my mind)’ – which featured on the inaugural teshcast – is the most out-going of the two. through the ambient noise of a crowded room (see, already it’s more social than anything burial made) it comes on strong with a punchy kick, throbbing sub and clatter of stirring hi-hats. a brushed-steel xylophone melody marks out the breakdown and peppers the backdrop, before a fresh kick’s youthful energy busts out its 2-step intentions once again and the whole thing finally melts to nothing as quickly as it appeared: job done; no fussin. ‘zeal’ meanwhile, on the flip, is a subdued soup of fulsome wood-block strikes, grubby hits and muddied beats. they skulk along, knocking against each other gently patting out a rhythm, whilst a delayed female vocal adds another vital layer. frankly, it would be haunting if it weren’t for the ethereal synth colours and harmonies which float like warm currents in the distance.

with assured, diverse cuts on lesser spotted labels like this one of skream’s and local imprint magicbag, it’s surely only a matter of time before youandewan is taken into the fold by a hessle audio or r&s type outlet. with such backing would surely come the confidence to get even more loose, and given the distant of this, largely garage, ep from his last fine dub techno outing, that’s a great prospect.

buy it

published on April 15, 2011 3:23 pm.
filed under: chicago house, disfigured dubz, garage, review, youandewan

outboxx – kate libby’s / bertie’s groove on immerse

last time i wrote about this label i said “immerse is a rare thing in today’s electronic music landscape… it’s actually underrated. traversing the darkened wormholes between crackling breakbeats, fizzing dubstep and sketchy techno – and despite having its roots in the bass music epicentre that is bristol – the label’s reach is far and wide with artists coming from ukraine, russia, london and the us.”

whilst all that is still true, you can now add house music into the imprint’s ever expanding pot of sounds thanks to this loose, funky two tracker from b- town production duo outboxx.

it’s not over familiar sounding house music, though, instead it seems to come from a different place – one where rounded, bouncing bottom ends are of most importance. adding colour to the warm-up 4/4 pomp of ‘kate libby’s’ are ever rising pads, wooden hits, bubbly claps and subtle hi hats for that all important sense of slide as well as bounce. a sparing ‘booooi’ vocal wins out on occasion to add the all important human touch and a combination of distant key strikes and jazzy sonic sketches blow the whole thing up into a deliciously heartfelt and organic slo-jam.

on the flip, ‘bertie’s groove’ is much more hurried where the beats, organ stabs and more metallic percussion almost fall over each other in their endlessly churning cycles. it’s reminiscent of a diynamic cut for its trackiness and instrumental flourishes, but a building mid-section and sporadic, tension-breaking flutter of keys mark it out more as a perky and quirky house number than a stale slice of dishwasher tech. again organic, again enveloped in sub bass, it’s a charming effort that draws a smile as well as a head nod which, if i were a dj, i would file under ‘classy ‘floor filler.’

buy it

published on March 30, 2011 4:09 pm.
filed under: deep house, immerse, outboxx, review

rick wilhite – analogue aquarium on still music

in amongst all the d-town names with which you are most familiar lurks rick ‘the godson’ wilhite. a lesser spotted talent than the likes of cohorts moodymann and theo parrish, it’s hard to work out why. one thing is for certain, the music he does release always sparks reams of forum debate given its unashamed devotion to analogue. though i’m inclined to say analogue stuff does sound better, truth is, i don’t really give a shit. so long as what comes out of the speakers sounds good, i really can’t see that it matters.

incredibly, given the fact he’s been doing this since the 90s (whilst also running the vibes new & rare music record store) analogue aquarium is the godson’s debut album. actually, it’s more a collection of singles, so don’t go expecting a load of unifying concessions to the full length – little segues, intros, downtempo numbers, whatever. that’s not to say these are homogenised ‘tracks’, no, instead the ten thick offerings busy themselves with exploring different pockets of warm, fuzzy house music: the sort of house music that (without reeking of nostalgia) reminds you of a time back in the day that you didn’t really live.

sometimes it has one foot in motown; sometimes it marches in an oppressively humid basement club; sometimes it’s isolated and lonely and, occasionally, it’s alive with the buzz of a busy room. there are raw, clunking machine sounds; stuttering, imperfect beats and apparently alive percussive hits that strike when you don’t expect them and miss when you do. component parts of tracks suddenly collapse, stumble or stutter before regaining themselves once again. that satisfying roughness speaks of human animation – rather than digital sequencing – and surely betrays a spontaneous, unhindered creative flow that breathes delightful life into the sounds you hear.

‘deep horizons’ references the sort of jazzy drums that made carl craig’s (as innerzone orchestra) ‘bugs in the bass bin’ such a great record; ‘in the rain‘ bumps along like an omar s offering; ‘sunshine pt 2’ dips its toe into toned-down rob hood minimalism and ‘muzic gonna save the world pt. 1’ brings to mind the dusty and lo-fi aesthetic of kassem mosse. as you should now be inferring, this is serious house music served up with spoons of us soul that you simply don’t get from a lot of cluttered, modern stuff. like i said, the analogue thing is of no real importance, but it would certainly take a lot of effort to make ones and noughts sound this… authentic.

published on March 23, 2011 3:39 pm.
filed under: detroit, house, review, rick wilhite

appleblim & october – ny fizzzzz/fountains on schmorgasbord

following a couple of recent posts about exciting new labels, here comes another…. schmorgasbord is an auspicious acetate project helmed by dj/producer and music writer oli warwick from his base in bristol. everyone knows the important role said city has played in dubstep’s development to date, but in fact the more erudite will know house and techno influences now loom ever larger. that these two efforts from bristol based producers october and ‘blim continue in that tradition, then, should come as no surprise.

that said, b-side ‘fountains of paradise’ actually sounds like asc or another one of the exit records/non plus crew at their most blissed-out. content on hanging in space and time, it’s about occult atmospheres, swirling synths and soft alien sounds all with but an occasional kick for anchorage. eventually cutting through the thick ambiance are meandering metallic hits that decay to nothing before appearing once again. there’s a sense of infinity to it all that has you believing sounds don’t start or stop but flow endlessly, almost as if the track had been playing a long time before you tuned in and will continue long after you leave: if the passing of deep time had a soundtrack, this would surely be it.

‘ny fizzzzz’ is more assertive thanks to its re-visioned chicago bump, but that’s not to say it becomes a narrow tool: it has the same sense of scale with little chord stabs appearing above; muffled analogue noises, drips and rips buried below and synthesised tones rising and falling like a warm tide. kinetic yet restrained and suggestive, its firm house music that gets schmorgasbord off to a very assured and classy start. (ps if you happen to live in bristol, make sure you check out the recently open record shop, idle hands, run by the people from the ever reliable label of the same name.)

published on March 17, 2011 3:22 pm.
filed under: appleblim, house, october, review, schmorgasbord

christopher rau – how are you on pampa

here comes some more pampa lovin’ on teshno: despite its infancy, the label is fast marking itself out as a go-to label for off-kilter house music in much the same way as has the man behind the imprint, dj koze. for its seventh release, the odd-ball champ enlists fellow hamburger christopher rau – the man who wrote one of 2010’s most considered house oeuvres, asper clouds, on the ever excellent and deeper-than-deep smallville.  this time out, though (on at least two of the three tracks) rau seems to be intent on having some fun – he uncouples his bottom ends and lets synths interject wildly and run off at odd angles rather than button them all down in the forward rolling grooves as he did throughout the mature, studied and tethered compositions which made up the aforementioned full length… 
  
‘pervading animal’ opens things with a spring like freshness in place of the dour autumn vibes of asper… long tailed hit-hats, a content house bump and repeatedly rippling keys build and build until they all get stripped back, bunched up and rolled out onto an expansive sonic plain once again.  it’s pleasant, not-too-down-on-itself deep house, but rather pales in comparison to the other two offerings. 
the first, ‘how are you’ has much more focus on freewheeling, beat driven rhythms, where busy drums pad out quickened, throbbing patterns in place of the flatter, elongated grooves which went before: they are deep but direct and, as they punch along, provide a nice vertical contrast to the aqueous, horizontal spills of the harmonics which bleed into the mix up above.
‘cfr’ is the most unhinged of the lot given the dominant characteristic – a bold, slightly discordant and roughshod synth sound which gets haphazardly layered over a broken kick drum at random intervals. it twists and turns, tunes and de-tunes and generously splatters the track with unpredictable, freaky and after hour colour that comes straight from the most sleep-deprived parts of your brain as it snakes about like an unfixed hose pipe.  like all the tracks here, cohesion comes from the warm, finely grained bass pillows which envelop you from the bottom up and, like all the tracks here, it makes for lovely, basement attuned house music which is as good in ‘phones as it is booming outta ‘bins. 

published on March 14, 2011 11:10 pm.
filed under: christopher rau, deep house, pampa records, review

visionquest at fabric

photography by lindsay barchan

so much has already been said about both, where does one start with a review of perennially world beating club, fabric, when headlined by current techno darlings visionquest? in the morning, when you wake up with an early party in the depths of your stomach as it churns in anticipation? on the train ride to london, where chat is dominated by what the night may hold? or at the pre-party session where everyone plays the records they’re hoping to hear on the sound system that beats all others? probably none of those, and although the queue never makes for that riveting an opening gambit, probably not there either, but i shall…

there are different lines for tickets, guestlist, fabric first members, all policed by bouncers and amiable staff ensuring you get in as quickly as possible, through the airport style security and onto a platform with wide staircases leading both up and down.  everyone behaves, not wanting to get turned away, but once inside (and having checked your coat for the reasonable price of one english pound at one of the two cloakrooms) excited patter begins to fill the cavernous stair well in which you now stand.  and so does, of course, a dull thud which emanates from somewhere deep down below…
toward it you eagerly tread, down the brick lined walls of a tidy urban staircase (where many a weary raver takes refuge later on), eventually coming to some large sets of two-way doors.  behind them, one of the most revered clubbing experiences in the world has played out, every weekend, for ten years.  no matter how many times you’ve been, it makes for an emotive moment as you approach them, for they shall forever be the doors which shield all manner of pleasurable unknowns.  push them open and you’re faced with a long, backlit bar and a cosmopolitan sea of people passing left to right, right to left; from room one to room two or three and vice-versa.  straight away you lose everyone in your crew to the vastness and the darkness. there’s no mobile reception down here either, so you’d better just hope you bump into them later on.
armies of staff ensure not a single passage way from this room to that; into the toilets; the stairs or outside to the sizeable smoking area is blocked. so, too, do they scoop up – with military efficiency – the heavy duty plastic, um, glasses from which we drink.  ‘so what?’ you bleat, but with x thousand people dropping their empties on the 3 different dancefloors for 10 odd hours, it would soon become impossible to dance if they weren’t taken care of: another subtle but essential touch which makes you feel as looked after as some fine dining bourgeoisie in a plush, city centre eatery.
photography by lindsay barchan

and so to the action in the thriving hub of the main room, with its shielded dj booth; opposing live stage; high ceilings lined with industrial ventilation tubes; pulsing-in-time-to-the-beat dancefloor and the final jewel in a crown full of them, the soundsystem…  with seth initially at the helm, it punches out a thick bottom end whilst sprinkling the percussion and synth lines on us from above.  the high ceiling means the sounds have room to breathe – there’s no reverb, they’re crystal clear and almost hang in the air just above us, blanketing us in a rich, hd sonic tapestry.

after seth’s set, during which he is distracted infrequently and always keeps both eyes on the job, the densely packed ‘floor turn on their heels to face crosson and curtiss. they stand a yard or so apart behind a desk, with a laptop each – ryan looking like hawtin, lee looking like a collegiate quarter back – both focussing hard as they begin their live set. it’s a taught journey through colourful tech, basslines to get hips stuck into and the odd vocal flex for brief moments of unifying repose.  the way the lighting randomly shifts from being beamed down on them from above, to coming in sheets from green lasers or from spots dotted around the walls constantly changes the whole dynamic of the room: sometimes it feels cavernous, sometimes it feels cramped, sometimes it disappears in a smoky fog.  whatever, the apparent architectural dynamism toys with your mind as the night goes on, only adding to the whole trip.
seth then appears in the booth behind us once again. with the bit between his teeth he sequences an arcing set which brushes up with brashy techno, warmer d-town sounds, maya jane coles edits and a deft selection of loveable classics (‘no way back‘ being the most apt of the night at 7am) which re-engage anyone who’s attention may have waned during the more esoteric passages of sound. it’s choice, dance-y, charming and clearly does the trick, for the ‘floor remains full (i mean dancing-with-your-hands-in-your-pockets full) ‘til well past breakfast time. 
without accusing visionquest of being louche at other times, there’s an underlying sense of professionalism to tonight’s proceedings. you get the impression a lot of prep went into it and that they really meant business from the word go.  they programmed a heartfelt, 360 degree musical experience (both literally and metaphorically) using  vinyl, laptops, playing back to back, solo and live though old school and new school sounds which proved as epic as are the connotations of their collective name.
photography by lindsay barchan

with kyle mf hall in the much cosier chamber that is room 3, and ben klock in the cave-like underground cavity of room 2 at various points during the morning, it’s impossible not to break off and go check them out. the former drops hip-hop influenced house beats with all the enthusiasm of a month old pup, whilst the latter slams out grainy techno shrouded in endless cloaks of reverb and echo. like the opposing vibes, the respective crowds are different, too: hall’s jump about like him, smiling and high on life; klock’s have their heads down, sweat endlessly and march deeper into their own worlds, ever further away from the drags of normality.   of course, these two rooms also offer something for those who shy away from main rooms and instead prefer the more isolated and darker confines of a smaller rave space. 

i’ve said before in my reviews that musical enjoyment is subjective. whilst visionquest turned in a ‘were you there?’ performance tonight, then, should they not be your thing, fear not… it would be hard not to find at least one event to your liking in any given week (let alone month) at fabric and, as such, there’s no reason not for everyone to try the place, at least once. as for the slight that tourists litter the place… of course they do: all the world’s wonders buzz with people wanting their slice of the action, but they go home before you will, and then it really gets good.   and anyway, there’s always the possibility they leave you with a hilarious anecdote as did one italian i spoke to who had come over from perugia, just to visit the club…
“what do you think?” i just about asked.
“it’s ok” he retorted, before continuing sans even the slightest sense of irony, “but full of tourists.”

published on March 10, 2011 12:52 pm.
filed under: fabric, lee curtiss, review, ryan crosson, seth troxler, shaun reeves, visionquest


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the woes of me ~ dave vega/seth troxler on exone

whilst the world sings about house and techno’s current slo-mo revolution (me included), there’s another one going on beneath the surface… a vocal one. i don’t mean vocal as in shitty signifiers like ‘yeah’ ‘detroit’ ‘house music’ or whatever, i mean actually semantically intact lyrics (ish) which have turned the psychedelic days of the naughties into the more spiritual times of now (see teej, art dept, jaar and more i probably forget).

back when the electronic horizon was shifting from bleak and minimal to warmer and more human, it was seth troxler who was at the forefront, bringing emotion back to techno alongside his detroit and w+l buddies, ryan, shaun, lee, zev, gadi and blah blah blah courtesy of tracks like ‘aphrika’, a deep cut which plundered maya angelou’s poem, phenomenal woman, for its wordy inspiration. now, though, the words come directly from troxler’s heart and mind (something only emphasised given the air in which they are delivered – like a whispered stream of conscious) on any number of tracks from ‘sing’ with deetron to ‘vampire nightclub’/’living the life’ with art department or ‘soulless dreamer’ on agoria’s (very solid) forthcoming lp, impermanence.

and here again they crop up, on the title track of this ep, scattered like seductively charming fairy dust over the dry beats of robert johnson resident, dave vega, to make for a track with a nice duality: on the one hand its dreamy and musing, the other driving and solid, depending where you put your focus. the groove is long and largely interrupted; is peppered only with the muted rumblings of analogue machines and fx and sparkles faintly like a distant star… it’s crisp, radiant and escapist stuff.

‘suspended in dust’ builds in phrases with new sonic motifs dropping into the solid house groove as it goes. a twanging synth; a classic tsk-tsk loop; boom-y kicks, all get layered up, stripped right back then slammed together again to make for a raw, frazzle-edged and propulsive dump of derelict house music. exercise one feed ‘woes’ through a kaleidoscopic lens which fractures sounds, keys, voices, machines, in every direction, only for them to gather around the thud-thud house beat once again. but it’s seth’s introspective whispers that stay with you beyond the final beat and, as is the case no matter with what they are paired, they add an enigmatic, tongue-in-cheek ardour that it’s hard not to dig.

published on March 2, 2011 5:39 pm.
filed under: dave vega, house, review, seth troxler, techno

blawan – bohla ep on r&s

i’m primarily a house and techno fan but, as time passes, dubstep and all its virulent off-shoots are becoming an ever harder mistress to ignore. it’s retarded-good eps like this new one on the reinvigorated r&s with its muscular, boisterous and machine made forms that increasingly have my eyes wandering in their direction. it’s only the second release from london based beat bully, blawan, and though his debut on hessle audio was just as tough and mechanical as are the tracks which make up this bohla ep, it didn’t quite bounce with such a satisfying grind.

the opener and title track, doused in a lip-curled, proto-acid funk, is the highlight: it’s twisted, squelching, only-just-restrained and has a thunderously kicking bottom end. pinging acid sounds strike when the sub booms and everything works together in resonant, bite size phrases to drag your head and shoulders back and forth, back and forth. wherever it comes from (dunno), whatever it’s influenced by (dunno), whatever it is (dunno) it grabs your attention like scalding water on the soft of your skin: awesome.

next track ‘kaz’ is less assertive, but instead fizzes with a nervous, kinetic energy in place of the immovable forces of ‘bohla’. frenetic acid lines rip in and out whilst a double kick punches out the lazy rhythm below, before the initial raspy madness is offset by passages of colourful xylophone (or something) which occasionally drip down from above, blissfully unaware of the sonic carnage they blanket with a calming humour. the end result is a mutant, twitching track that verges on the edge of insanity but never quite seals the deal.

then, as soon as the bump ‘n’ grind drums of the final track begin their first cycle, you realise what blawan’s overriding strength is: programming loose riding, rough edged and raw loops and working around the jilted but hypnotic rhythms to which they give rise. the one throughout ‘lavender’ is clipped and punchy and has only various flurries of acid rain to contend with but, even when stripped so bare and simple, can’t go on long enough. nevermind blawan, try badman!

published on February 24, 2011 9:22 pm.
filed under: blawan, dubstep, r+s, review

soul clap – social experiment 002 on no19 music

i sort of feel like i want to come to soul clap’s defense having been an early supporter of them. although i’m sure they aint losing any sleep over it (the only reason for that, of course, would be their ever fuller dj diaries – in your face, haters!) the boston pair seem to have evolved from funky funsters 18 months ago into – in certain circles anyway – popular whipping boys.  i posit a couple of reasons for that…firstly people are still scared of dancing music with such overt emotion; music which is so openly accessible; so fun. i guess that’s not surprising given that the cold, inhuman and austere halcyon days of labels like minus is but only a couple of years behind us, but electronic music is all about evolution and context.  as such, the world’s a much darker place now than it was then… financially, politically, environmentally… we now need our escapist weekend activities to bring us soul, warmth and joy, rather than abstract digital isolation.  so just accept it or ignore it, but don’t get so wound up…
the other reason seems more clear cut – their edits: you either love them or loathe, which is fine, but it i put it to loathers that the edit is but one tool in soul clap’s box, so don’t write them off because of it.   this mix proves the pair are also fine selectors (don’t forget, before you knew about them they were pro djs working department stores and the like in their hometown)  – something which cannot be said of many modern acts where the actual art of crafting a dj set is ever more lost in amongst the ketamine and shitty club chat. it’s a mix for jonny white’s no 19 music that squeezes so much in it’s maybe a little too much, but only because almost every record included hits a sweet spot, and it’s a shame one or two get cut short in order to fit them all in.
as they like to do, the tracklist is rather kept in family, with efforts from sect, benoit & sergiot, no regular play, lee foss, deniz kurtel and art department all featuring.  whether bubbling with vocal joy, dripping in sexual overtones or bumping along to hip house beats, the mix twists and turns down a number of paths without ever getting lost or becoming unbalanced. it’s pretty remarkable that, despite drawing almost exclusively on the work of their close friends, the mix is in no way homogenised or blunted.  colourful 80s synths, new york disco basslines and modern twists on those themes are all put together with an innate sense of fun and take you through a full spectrum of sounds that never stray too far from a perfect dancing tempo, but which get never get bogged down in one place for too long. it makes for irresistibly sexy stuff.
special mention goes to the last track, a soul clap and art department collab, ‘glen and boo’, which manages to imbue a swaggering, skanking dubstep beat with as much soulful libidinousness as their usual house records: it clearly runs deeps in the duo. so, whether you like it or not, soul clap hit the mark they aim for better than anyone else and do it with love to spare. for that reason, they deserve a lot of respect. 

published on February 23, 2011 2:00 pm.
filed under: no 19 music, review, soul clap

nicolas jaar – space is only noise on circus company

[written quite a bit about jaar in the last few months for various places so, should you have subjected yourself to any of it, you may notice recurrent themes in the words below...  they're my theories and i'm sticking to them, though, so tough]

people keep try to square away nicolas jaar as a house and/or techno producer.  but they shouldn’t. bar the odd track, his music, if anything, is more a descendant of hip hop.  he himself likes to call it bluewave.  whatever your opinion of that epithet, the thinking behind it is solid: blue as in blues and all its emotional connotations, and wave as in the motion – gentle to-ing and fro-ing; occasional breaking ripples and the odd swollen undercurrent all carrying you along like a sad bit of drift wood. you dip below the surface, only to briefly reappear before being folded inwards once again. it’s hypnotising, detaches you from reality like a day dream and sounds like little else, whatever you wanna call it.

what makes it all the more intriguing is that, despite the vintage, sounds-like-he-just-miced-up-a-disney-animated-room-full-of- instruments finish, it is all made on pc (though he is a keen proponent of a good mic).  whilst hawtin and others pushed computer cpus to the limit with a hundred and twelve-ty loops running all at the same time, jaar is experimenting with them in other ways.  his aim is to make computer made noises sound like aged instruments, and he succeeds.  bass notes sound played by someone with palpable attitude, and not just flat and dead as if straight from a machine.  the keys are so drenched in melancholy you can almost see the player’s fingers drooping over them.  ‘i got a woman’ is like the saddest fairground ride you never went on;  both heavy but charming.
as well as instruments there are the sounds of tennis balls, gravel, scratching, wood, liquids, popping, crackling and other such noises all peppering jaar’s languid soundscapes. they are the noises of everyday life normally muffled by, well, the noise of everyday life.  isolated and amplified, though, they make this an intimate record, almost as if you have a glass to the door of jaar’s world.  you can’t escape that feeling that you’re listening closely, fully engaged in the goings on. and all this engagement despite the fact that ‘space’ features at least as much – if not more prominently – than ‘noise’ in jaar’s records.
within each track and across the album as a whole (and it is an album in the truest sense of the word), fluidly and without jar does nico switch the tempo from head swaying to hip hopping, or the mood from down-there to up-here.   the sparsity of the arrangements means that when a new element does comes in, it has maximum impact; when a kick thumps a heartbeat harder, it moves your world.  (that’s a touch homoerotic but the point is, not being near full throttle all the time means you have plenty of room to accelerate, even if it’s to a mere 100bpm.) 
to crudely sum up, this is an arty album from an arty kid which rewards patience and attention on the one hand, but which pleases just as much when played in the background during a meal with your in-laws. or whatever.  it’s that duality which means that, although there seems barely anything to it on the surface, space is only noise is in fact a deep masterpiece which will have you coming back for more.  and more. and more.
ps: as mentioned, i was lucky to interview nico a couple of times before christmas so here’s a fact for you: the baby on the cover of the album is him, in the no-man’s-land between east and west germany that existed shortly after the fall of the berlin wall…. “a place [at that time] with no ideology, dialogue, struggle or anything else… just a space lost in the middle of two worlds.”

published on February 15, 2011 2:55 pm.
filed under: circus company, house, nico jaar, review

steffi – yours & mine on ostgut ton

thought i’d weigh in on this one because it’s proved divisive so far. if you’ve heard any of steffi‘s records (there have been only six) you’ll likely know the issue… can something so familiar and un-original be in any way considered ‘good’? of course it can, as long as it’s done well and shies away from pastiche, and that’s exactly the case throughout the frictionless house excursion that is steffi’s ostgut ton released debut, yours & mine.

also worth considering when embroiled in the artistic merit vs regurgitative cop-out debate is the fact that this berlin based producer is primarily a dj and, by all accounts (haven’t seen her, will soon thankfully) an excellent one. it makes sense, then, that she will make records informed by her many hours at the helm of one of the most revered dancefloors of the day (pbar): she knows exactly the sort of record which gets people moving, so why re-invent the wheel? why not just finely tune what you know to fit your own purpose? as such, come to this expecting warm, high quality, deep-but-driving house music that isn’t too down on itself, and you’ll not be disappointed…

the album hits the ground running with ‘lilo’ which, like the record overall, is built on (and focuses around) an assertive house groove. throughout, discrete acid twitches prick an otherwise harmonic cloud of chords which lingers throughout, and the first surge down into deep space has begun… from there, the kicks spread further apart and the sounds in-between wiggle a little more, or machines get unleashed and sounds bend and ping-pong about more freely, but the grooves are continuous, long and deep, and remain ever present reminders that this is dancing music. classy dancing music, but dancing music.

‘manic moods’ encapsulates the album in six minutes – punchy kicks and firm but not immovable basslines with, should you look for them, some subtle future motifs and cute sci-fi signifiers off somewhere in the distance. it says a lot about the quality of these tracks that, although they are all variations on a tried-and-tested theme, sticking nine of them together on an album doesn’t add up to a bit of a chore come the final few. punctuated as the album is with standouts like the chunky analogue bounce and unashamed vocal passion of ‘yours,’ though, and the amassed effect is instead a well balanced concoction of rejoice and reserve. essentially, these are the powerful tools of steffi’s very personal trade. if you like her trade, you’ll like her tools, because a finer set it would be hard to find.

published on February 12, 2011 7:46 pm.
filed under: deep house, ostgut ton, review, steffi

furesshu – lucid / all i want on project squared

this is why i love the internet… late the other night i was scanning twitter (as i do all too often) when furesshu tweeted he’d done a new mix. i knew he was a bristol based music maker but couldn’t remember how i’d come to be following him so i checked it out. the way he so tightly laid down a selection of warehouse (read berghain, i guess) music from the murky underworlds of house and techno gripped me. an hour later and i was surfing – nay steamrolling - the ‘net to find out more like a hapless addict looking to fill his ‘pipe. enter the ripest findings of my research… this upcoming new ep on auspicious young label, project squared (i was also compelled into bothering the man known as luke standing for an interview. he kindly agreed, so watch out…)

it’s not his first release - previous efforts on this label and the excellent immerse have traversed the nether regions of techno, dub and half step freely – though it’s one which suggests furesshu (pronounced fu. rea. shu) is not settled on any one – or three - styles just yet, forging as it does house vibes with his previous techier inflections. the problem with some of the ostgut/klock/etc techno to which furesshu is closely related is – for me - that it can be too immovable… tracks are constructed as huge, imposing greyscale walls. with these tracks, though he manages to embed a sense of swing and groove into his echoing, thumping beats. they form sonic chambers rather than solid barricades and are just that bit more inviting, that bit less relentless, though retain the same bottom-end punch.

anyway, lucid is first up where grainy stabs echo to form a stormy backdrop and a vocal cry lingers in the frosty air. down below, bumping beats tumble repetitively and keeping dragging you in as the various other elements shift in and out alignment with each other drawing focus to many different points as they go: it makes for a hood-up, head-down solid groove of the sort i exactly love. ‘all i want’ is even more overtly house tinged, with a diva vocal calling out ‘iiii want’ all the way through as stormy claps, muted acid stabs and reverbing bass channels steffi and pbar as much as the more austere jackers mentioned above.

a shifted remix rounds out the package with a more hurried and urgent stomp through the dark, dusty corners of some derelict old building with only glitching hand claps and shwirling dub torrents for company, ensuring that not only is this an essential purchase, but that furesshu and project squared are essential ones to watch starting… now.

published on February 11, 2011 3:30 pm.
filed under: dub techno, furesshu, house, project squared, review, techno

isolee/whrume – taktell/thora vukk on pampa

this isolee/robag whrume split release is exciting before you even hit play, simply because the two tracks included are mere pre-cursors of the respective full lengths to come (actually, isolee’s ‘well spent youth’ is already here and is already close to the top of my 2011 ‘best of’ pile). add into that pre-play excitement the fact it comes on koze’s fast flourishing pampa imprint and, despite the lack of any remixes, you have a genuinely semi-inducing prospect.

isolee takes the a side with ‘taktell’, a woozy, gently howling house number whose bottom end sways to-and-fro as diacritic strings and percussion add layer upon layer of deft intonation. its structure is so complex, unconventional and ever shifting that it’s hard to imagine the track being dropped into an average deep house set but, if it were, the way rajko müller hangs his grooves so effortlessly in murky 4/4 would have you wishing they lasted twice as long.

‘thora vukk’ is whrume’s contribution and is one which doesn’t sound out of place next to the work of isolee. it draws from the same sort of off kilter and unhinged sound palette as his, (as well as label mates axel boman and koze) but does so more sparingly. instead of constructing the track with myriad sonic flecks, the former wighnomy brother lays down a steady kick and has his quirky sounds (boingy synths, popping fx, plummeting harmonics) interlope recursively around them to make for an entrancing groove which forever seems to unravel as it goes. his full length can’t come soon enough…

published on February 8, 2011 7:32 pm.
filed under: house, isolee, pampa records, review, robag whrume