Fresh Kicks 117: Otik
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Fresh Kicks 115: Amazondotcom
Last track that blew your mind?
“Radeco Domar ‘Por Un Ojo’
Last film you watched?
‘Midsommar’
Last DJ that blew your mind?
‘UPGRAYEDD SMURPHY’
Favourite album to relax to?
“Thelonious Alone in San Francisco”
Favourite producer?
“Siete Catorce”
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Recognise: Air Max '97
A year on from his debut album, and a year after moving from Australia to London, the latest Air Max ‘97 project has landed, the four-track ‘Falling Not Walking’ EP. The release features two collaborations with artists also impressing with their own distinctive shades of club music — Italian producer TSVI on ‘Paroxysm’, and Manchester’s LOFT on ‘Xhrinicibles’.
Decisions is a label founded on the basis of releasing idiosyncratic “music to move people”. With past releases from the likes of DJ Plead and Oroboro, van der Lugt is excited about the label’s upcoming projects. The first, from Avbvrn, due later this month, and later Isamov, a producer from New York City whose tracks feature in recent Air Max ‘97 sets (including his Recognise mix).
With upcoming shows in London, New York, Glasgow and Madrid, Air Max ‘97 also recently played a show in Hangzhou, China, in a venue called Loopy, behind the food court on the third floor of a mall. “It’s a concrete cube with a huge Funktion-One soundsystem,” he says. “I was so gassed to finally go there, the crowd was amazing, creative, young and free.” Travelling the world is an “indescribable privilege” for van der Lugt, who will never miss an opportunity to meet local people, eat in their favourite restaurants, and explore local scenes.
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Stanton Warriors: "It's time for a more underground sound to rise"
Ikonika shares track via Adult Swim, ‘Resurrection Machine’: Listen
Adult Swim Singles have teamed up with Hyperdub affiliate Ikonika for its 44th label release, 'Resurrection Machine'.
A typically fierce club cut to the core, the bass-laden and ominous 'Resurrection Machine' is the DJ/Producer's first release since 'Into U' on Bok Bok and L-Vis 1990's Night Slugs earlier this year.
On Cue: Plaid
The emotional blend of many elements is something Plaid have refined over almost 30 years of recording together as a duo. They’ve moulded a characterful sound from meandering off-world melodies that bound off at unexpected tangents, and beats that skirt the edges of dance music but refuse to conform to stiff regulation. ‘Polymer’ finds Plaid in especially tuneful form, while maintaining the exploratory impulse that has made them one of the UK’s most celebrated leftfield electronic acts.
Though they might intend to make dancefloor-geared material, Plaid’s way of creating sounds instead leads them off on more colourful, non-linear paths, governed by interweaving harmonic ideas rather than gridded beat structures.
“We love dance music and it influences our work, but we find it difficult keeping things simple,” Turner says. “When we’re working on a few bars for hours, it feels natural to keep adding or altering to keep ourselves interested. We want the listener to go back to discover more.”
“The branch of techno we loved initially was the hopeful Detroit version, the Carl Craig, Derrick May, Juan Atkins stuff,” Ed Handley says. “A lot of their earlier output was very positive, it was sort of melancholic, but it was trying to find a better way. It was a response to alienation, trying to create something warm from the technology. I’ve always liked the meeting of the two, where you have this machine quantisation, but then you have these almost romantic harmonies.
Though Plaid appreciate the positive effects of technology — as well as noting its potentially harmful aspects — their feelings on the damage brought about by mass consumption and climate change are clear. Both are supporters of activists Extinction Rebellion, and hail the recent peaceful protests in London as a positive step.
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How the Moscow bass scene is tearing down the city's techno barriers
Dog Blood announce collectible action figures
Dog Blood have returned with a new EP. And to celebrate, Skrillex and Boys Noize are calling on fans to help them create collectible action figures.
Announced via Twitter, Skrillex is asking fans to submit their drawings of the duo. Whoever wins will have their illustration transformed into an official Dog Blood Collectible Figure.
The competition is run with Fan Forge and Good Smile Company, and comes with the release of the new Dog Blood EP, ‘Turn Off The Lights’.
Dog Blood drop new EP, ‘Turn Off the Lights’: Listen
Dog Blood have just dropped a new EP, 'Turn Off The Lights', their first release together in six years.
Bass titans Boys Noize and Skrillex, the latter who's also been releasing new solo remixes, have recruited guest collaborations for the four-tracker including Otira, X&G, and Josh Pan.
On Cue: Logos
Logos is, by his own admission, not the most prolific producer. The London-based artist, otherwise known as James Parker, still works a dayjob, and in the near-six years since the release of his groundbreaking debut album ‘Cold Mission’ has added the rather time-consuming endeavour of raising a kid to his list of non-musical pursuits. What his discography lacks in quantity, however, is made up tenfold in quality.
“I ended up working with a few synth patches I really liked, and I basically just rinsed them,” recalls Parker, mentioning the cohesive sound of the album ‘Tooth’ by Blackest Ever Black regulars Raime (who also released on Different Circles last year) as a point of reference. “‘Cold Mission’ was me trying a lot of things out, and then this one was me saying I actually just wanna focus in on one or two ideas, and then reiterate,” he adds.
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