Welcome back. As ever, a combination of too much university work and laziness on my half is the reason for my absence. But we’re coming back super strong today with a stream of the mind-bendingly incredible new album from Nottingham producer Lone.
I personally first heard about Lone after the release of his last album, Emerald Fantasy Tracks, a psychedelic, 90s rave-influenced journey. Now, amongst much anticipation, Hype Machine have put up a stream of the new album, Galaxy Garden, that comes out via the consistently excellent R&S Records. Have a listen below and see what you think; personal highlights for me are when Lone really goes for it, tracks like As A Child and Crystal Caverns 1991. It certainly sounds like it was made a million miles away from Nottingham.
The currently undisputed king of dance-labels, Numbers, hosted one of the biggest parties of last year in December in a London warehouse. Jackmaster, one of the co-founders of Numbers, was one of the many DJs to lay down a killer set on the night, and it’s now available to download as a tasty MP3.
As Jackmaster puts it in his description of the mix, “I played some of biggest tunes of the year as a kind of retrospective. For the same reason, there’s also a few blends from my Fabric CD and the RA mix and few of the tracks that i rinsed heavily in my sets throughout 2011, plus the usual selection of surprises.” A few of those surprises include a timely Whitney Houston song to kick off the set, a certain Radiohead song, and, well, the rest i’ll keep a surprise.
To download the MP3, just enter your e-mail in the widget below. Then turn the lights off in your room, pretend you’re in a dingy warehouse and enjoy.
P.S; a guy by the name of HURFDURFLOLWHAT has very kindly put a tracklist online if you don’t mind having the surprises ruined.
Jessie Ware put out a song entitled ‘Running’ the other day, and now Disclosure have put their remix of the song online quicker than you could say the word running itself.
For two guys so young, I find it hard to comprehend how they can make a remix that sounds so crisp and would undoubtedly slay any dancefloor. The production itself is absolutely astounding, leaving me feeling both jealous of their talent and fairly useless as a human being. If you haven’t heard the original, go here, and then enjoy this banger of a remix.
I still haven’t got bored of Brontide’s album Sans Souci yet, and to be honest I don’t think I ever will, be in the unlikely case that anyone is, they recently released a video for their new single Coloured Tongues.
Intricate loops, edgy melodies, bloody epic breakdowns; it’s got everything you expect from Brontide and that little bit more. The video is awesome, too.
P.S; the band also announced yesterday that they are supporting Thrice at their London show in April. Good luck!
“There’s a new Usher track” isn’t a phrase that tends to instantly catch my eye (OMG is one of the worst songs that has graced the earth), but when Diplo is involved, I am straight there.
Climax is undoubtedly a gargantuan return to form for the R’n'B legend. Produced by Diplo, he described the song as “some next level electro soul” and “seriously the best record i’ve ever been part of”. He’s done an incredible job, and it’s one of the most self-restrained productions i’ve heard from him. In fact, absolutely everything about this song is great. The production, the arrangement, the lyrics, everything. It’s just a shame this wasn’t released in time for Valentines Day.
Say hello to the most interesting and perhaps disturbing song-and-video of the year so far.
DVA, the London producer signed to Hypderdub and former Rinse FM breakfast DJ, has released a video for a song off of his upcoming album Pretty Ugly, which is released next month.
Where I Belong is essentially a fanfare. I don’t think there is really any other way to describe it. On its own it is epic yet unsettling, but when accompanied with a video depicting the crucifixion of Jesus, it just becomes downright weird. The video was made by Dean Blunt, one half of the music/art collective Hype Williams, and whilst not the most obvious choice for an accompanying video, it works extremely well indeed.
If there’s been one tune that has been on repeat in my room all week, this is it.
Treehouse has been knocking around for ages, but it’s only recently been released on 12″ his imprint Push & Run, which I gratefully managed to pick up last week.
The tune is essentially the best parts of what James Blake does, but i’m not even bothered when it sounds this good. It is basically the kind of stuff I want James Blake to be making 24/7; you can leave the blub-step by the front door, cheers. As well as the recent physical release, an official video recently surfaced in which some guy (i’m not sure if it is Mr Dafyyd or not) walks around London with a panda head on.
Morning folks. Yeah i’ve been gone a while, but i’m back now.
The last few days have been a treasure trove of awesome music, and in the next few days I will try and get all of what i’m enjoying up on here. But this is something pretty special: Quakers.
If you don’t know, Quakers is a new 36-piece hip-hop collective formed by Geoff Barrow of Portishead. If that isn’t mental enough, they’re releasing a 41-TRACK album next month on STONES THROW, featuring the likes of ALOE BLACC, GUILTY SIMPSON and MED. You can hear two of them on this track, Fitta Happier, which samples some sort of brass version of Radiohead’s The National Anthem. Is that good enough for ya?!
Picking a top five of 2011 was absolutely torturous. There have been so many great albums this year that have been on heavy rotation and I didn’t want them to go unmentioned. So here is #10-6 in my ‘Best Of’, and then a list of honourable mentions. Jolly good, chaps.
The #1 spot in my top albums of 2011 may come as a surprise to some, or it may not if you’ve had a look on my Last.fm plays. I compiled this album list based purely on how much I have played them and how much I have enjoyed them, not on whether it makes this blog look ‘cool’ or not, and God knows it doesn’t get enough views to be judged anyway. But this album has been the most fun, exciting, intelligent and stimulating thing i’ve listened to all year.
2011 for myself has been an introduction into the mesmerising world of UK electronic music, and I got into Rustie through Hudson Mohawke, who mentioned him in an interview he did with The Guardian back in August (look right at the end of the article). Not too long after that interview, Rustie put a few tracks off his upcoming album Glass Swords on his Soundcloud which had me and many others absolutely hooked, he played a superb set at Bestival which I managed to catch, and then on October 11th Glass Swords finally came out.
A lot of albums this year were apocalyptic and pessimistic, but where artists such as PJ Harvey were predicting the downfall of England (a prediction which partly came true with the summer riots), Glasgow’s Russell Whyte was recording some of the most euphoric, clever dance music heard in decades. Where others took influence from their gloomy surroundings, Rustie took influence from video games and 80′s prog-rock, amongst many other things.
After an intro comprised of reversed electric-guitars and crystal-clear synths, Flash Back kicks in, with it’s distinctly 80′s staccato bass and lead synth. And this is Glass Swords just getting started. As you continue to listen you’ll hearsamples from The Legend of Zelda on Hover Traps, the west coast hip-hop vibe of City Star, shredding synth-guitars on Cry Flames (which Whyte recorded using a MIDI guitar controller), and the simply mind-blowing drop on Ultra Thizz, which might flip you inside-out the few first times you hear it. But you then begin to appreciate the complexity of the compositions, the sleekness of the harmonies and the timeliness of the melodies. This album makes any experience better, whether it’s raving in the middle of a dance floor at 3am or waiting on a train station platform at 3pm.
Glass Swords is “digital maximalism” at it’s very best, a term coined by excellent music writer Simon Reynolds in an article he wrote for Pitchfork. The sounds are so perfect and sharp that you can almost hear the binary code being processed. But since when has that been a bad thing? It’s 2011 after all, a year with a distinct absence of guitars and acoustic instruments in it’s best music. This is expertly crafted electronic music; uplifting, inspiring and magical.
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