on saturday august 10th and sunday 11th, circo loco in the arena returns to birmingham with a huge selection of acts playing two events across the rainbow venues, in the street, a garden, and one afterparty, all against the industrial central birmingham back drop and beneath some vast and aged railway arches.
teshno
'in germany, they can't say 'techno,' they say 'teshno'' ~ seth troxler [march 2008]
circo loco in the arena and type festival announce 2013 line-up
interview ~ tale of us
here comes the feature i did with tale of us for the february issue of dj mag.
seth troxler goes in the lab for nrk
big news… after more than a year in the making, nrk have announced seth troxler has mixed the next edition of the label’s in the lab series. due for release in october, it’s the detroit dandy’s second official mix cd following on from his boogybytes effort in february 2010. this time, though, the visionquest man has been allowed to stretch his legs over two cds.
plat du jour ~ seth troxler: essential mix
last night, seth took over the bbc radio 1 airwaves and turned in his first ever essential mix. apparently recorded in one take, the two hour selection – according to the man himself during an amusingly manipulated intro – includes his usual styles of “contemporary dance and underground pop as well as experimental electronic music.”
as you should expect, the mix arcs nicely from the charming, colourful stuff to start, through more dance-y grooves in the middle and on to deeper stuff towards the end (including the penultimate track which is one of my favourites ever, tiga’s ‘gentle giant’). so, stick it on, turn it up and wig out…
visionquest at fabric
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photography by lindsay barchan
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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.”
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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.
plat du jour ~ seth troxler
it was his podcasts which first got me interested in seth troxler a few years ago. now here i am, with a blog in his honour and a cat named after him (yeah) delighted to have come across another on soundcloud. previous efforts for ra, save the cannibals (twice) and particularly ibiza-voice laced together deep, trippy, melancholic, moody house and techno with a fluidity few others could match. over the course of almost two hours, this mix nimbly shifts through a number of gears without ever losing focus on the underlying groove. i don’t recognise many of the records but one of the reason i love troxler’s sets is that, inevitably, i’ll remember most of them. each has something to say for itself, not a single one is there to plug a gap, and together they make for awesome listening…
smooth operator – seth troxler
ok, it’s been a while since the last post on teshno (life kinda gets in the way, you know) but i’m back. in the coming weeks i have a deniz kurtel interview for you but, in the meantime, enjoy (hopefully) this feature i wrote on seth.
it was originally published in last month’s dj mag but i reproduce it here, in full, so more people get to see it. (incidentally, it was published with the same images, too, which i assume gave the piece its title in the mag. they are now part of my private collection.)
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detroit house and techno ~ the interviews
something i wrote for idj mag in the uk – thought it worth sharing…
the intro…
the re-release of robert hood’s ‘minimal nation,’ and carl craig’s re-instatement as musical director of the demf, are momentous events, not far behind us. shadows of the first and second wave detroit forefathers, then, perennially loom large over the shoulders of any new motor city blood. whether that pressure is why techno headlines have come mainly from berlin in the last couple of years or not, is now irrelevant: detroit’s where it’s at in 2009.
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seth troxler ~ interview
seth’s rocked my world this year. his music has character, as does he, and that’s something house and techno could do with more of. there’s playfulness, seriousness, depth and charm to his work, and i reckon some of that comes through in this interview, too. he’s done a load of them recently so some questions are as you’d expect, some are aimed at prising a nugget of info from the man that no one else has before. let me know if i succeeded, then sample his sounds with an ra, ibiza-voice or save the cannibals podcast.