At the end of this month, secretsundaze will release Finish Me, the third EP from George Levings (a.k.a. Commix) under his Endian moniker, which he started to be used as an outlet for the “more technoey and house sound” that is increasingly inspiring him. The EP follows on from his previous releases on Electric Minds and Non Plus Records, with three storming tracks that you might have noticed popping up in various DJ sets lately—the most notable being Joy Orbison who used “Finish Me” in his essential mix late last year. “Finish Me” is a stomping cut propped up by a body-shaking breakbeat groove, with industrial-tinged samples, dramatic pads, and skittering percussion running wild on top. The full EP will be available via secretsundaze on May 25 and can be preordered here, with the title track available to stream in full below.
Lone‘s now classic debut album, Lemurian, will receive a deluxe reissue by Magic Wire and R&S on June 29. Originally released in 2008, the album will return remastered by Matt Colton, with new artwork—which can be seen above—by Konx-om-Pax and on vinyl for the first time. The initial press will be on colored vinyl, with a spot gloss cover, a full color printed inner, and a download code. You can check out the full tracklisting for Lemurian‘s reissue below, along with Lone’s remaining US tour dates.
Tracklisting:
1. Koran Angel 2. Cali Drought 3. Interview at Honolulu 4. Banyan Drive 5. Green Sea Pageant 6. Girl 7. Orange Tree 8. Maya Codex 9. Atoll Mirrored 10. Sea Spray 11. Under Two Palms 12. Lens Flare Lagoon 13. Borea 14. Buried Coral Banks 15. Phthalo Blue 16. Sunken 17. Minor Suns
Canadian-born Marc Houle is not a DJ; he is widely acclaimed electronic musician who produces his own music and performs it live, beat for beat, drum for drum. Artists today can spend their whole careers striving for originality in what is a continually saturating market, but this is exactly what Houle has achieved by combining the house sounds of Detroit and Chicago to create his own unique blend of synth-heavy minimalist techno. It’s a decade on from his debut LP, 2004’s Restore, on Richie Hawtin’s Minus label—and now Houle’s givin his seminal release a stunning makeover called Restored, calling on some of the leading names in modern techno for contemporary remixes, including Danny Daze, Harvard Bass, Julian Jeweil, Joris Voorn, M.A.N.D.Y., Popof and Houle himself. On the verge of the U.S leg of his Restored tour, Houle kindly agreed to partake in XLR8R’s latest edition of 20 Questions.
Where in the world are you right now? I’m back home in Berlin, enjoying the grey sky and warm studio.
What were your reasons for moving to Berlin in 2008? What’s the best/worst thing about the city and how does it compare to Windsor, Ontario? For years I was coming to Berlin and staying with friends so I could play shows around Europe before returning back to Canada. Europe was really the only place I could actually make a living playing my music. While I was visiting, I learned how amazing this city really is and slowly realized that it was the only place I could live, so I moved my studio over and have loved it ever since. Growing up in Windsor was so good because it was five minutes to drive to downtown Detroit where all the crazy parties were in the ’90s. Without growing up there and experiencing the Detroit techno scene, I would not be doing what I do now.
Where is your favorite place in the world to visit? As unglamorous as it may sound, I love going back home to Windsor to see my family, for obvious reasons. Besides that, I guess Japan—its so fun out there and the food is amazing, and the people I know are very special to me. Argentina and Colombia are probably the most fun to play because they just go insane.
What do you miss most when you are on the road, and why? A lot of my peers are able to sit at a laptop, open up Ableton and make tracks on the road. I’ve tried over the years and I just can’t seem to do that. Maybe it’s the lack of gear. Maybe it’s ’cause I gotta use headphones…but I really miss making music on the road which is a good thing because when I do come back home, I go crazy.
Does music production/performing now feel more like a job rather than just a hobby? When I was younger, I was really into graphic design and turned that into my career. I began to loathe it to the point where I don’t really care about fonts or open up Photoshop anymore. I always made sure that the same thing wouldn’t happen to music. I’ve been making electronic music for about 30 years now. I’ve always known that it’s something I’ve needed to do, but I never expected or even thought about doing this for a living. It’s a passion of mine first and career second. To me, keeping it fun, challenging and exciting out trumps everything else. A big advantage I have is that as a live act, I can tour around and play and party then come back and balance out things by working in the studio for a while. The balance works well and it keeps everything fresh.
Did you first envisage yourself more as a music producer or a live artist? I’m definitely more of a producer. I could live without touring but I couldn’t live without creating.
How have your production techniques evolved over time? They haven’t, really. I still have most of the same gear I started with and I still use Cubase. So the way I do things isn’t much different—but obviously, after all this time, my ears have gotten better at making things sound the way I want. I listen to my old stuff sometimes and laugh about how poorly it was mixed or how muddy things sound. The most important for me is being comfortable enough where I don’t have to think too much in the studio; I can just play music and have fun creating.
What was the first record you ever bought? Maybe Iron Maiden—Live after Death? I remember sitting at the mall and opening it up while sitting at a fountain. It was so fun because it had a giant book inside with loads of pictures. It’s so vivid, even today.
What is your favorite non-electronic album? Maybe the Spoons from Canada—Arias & Symphonies. There are synths in the band but it’s more rock I suppose. Van Halen’s 1984 is also pretty fun. Oh, and Black Sabbath—Paranoid. Sianspheric’s Somnium is amazing, too
What is the best DJ/Live set you’ve ever seen? Probably [Richie] Hawtin in Detroit at one of the Plastikman warehouse parties back in the ’90s. It’s all a blur but I remember those parties being remarkably good and looonnnngggggg.
Why the longstanding preference for live sets over DJing? What do you feel it offers that a DJ set does not? The good part about playing live is that you are playing songs that you know better than anything else. No DJ could know every aspect of my track like I do so I can work them and play them like nobody else can. It’s unique to me. The bad part is that a DJ can take a track from anywhere and play it so his arsenal is much bigger. I could never DJ. It would feel weird for me to be on stage playing someone else’s song.
“My goal isn’t to get praised for playing original tracks; it’s to make people dance.”
Do you ever feel that people fail to properly grasp the concept of and skill involved in performing a live set? Sure. When I’m up there, I’m so busy counting in my head, planning, thinking—and people are used to DJs who can put a track on and have a drink and talk to friends. Most people on the dancefloor have no clue what a live act is and probably just think I’m Djing. But that’s all fine to me. My goal isn’t to get praised for playing original tracks; it’s to make people dance. So that’s all I ever care about—doing my job.
Does the current state of the electronic music scene excite you, and why/why not? Ha, ha—tough question. Without sounding like an old jaded curmudgeon…lately I’ve been watching big DJs play the same crappy music because it’s easy and it works. It sounds like they’re playing one loop for hours and hours and every 16 bars playing a sound effect and cutting out the bass before bringing it back in for the crowd to go “woo.” I call it Buji tech because it just goes “buji buji buji buji.” There’s always sub-bass, usually on the 3, 7,1 1 and 15 playing along a shuffle beat. It has no soul to it.
How has your attitude towards music production and performing changed over the years?
Not really, no. I’ve gotten better at cleaning out all the mud though. I’ve come to realize that every sound I put in usually needs only a small portion of the overall mix so I’m always removing unwanted frequencies to make room for other instruments and to let more space come in. My tracks don’t sound as muddy as they used to. As for performing, I think I’ve gotten much better at being flexible and being able to customize my show on the fly. I can tailor to what the people on the dancefloor need to hear, and not what I’ve prepared ahead of time. I still have fun up there though even if I may look deep in concentrated thought.
How are your preparations coming along for your Restored tour? Does touring continue excite you as much as it did or has it just become part of the job? The only time I get exhausted from touring is when it’s not a weekend thing but an extended tour that takes me away from my home life and studio too long. Otherwise I look forward to the shows and the parties and all the great like-minded people along the way. Also, I’m always throwing new gear in the live show mix, so it’s exciting to take it on the road and test it.
What’s a typical day like for you leading up to a performance? Eat, sleep, play, after-hours, plane, repeat.
What were your motivations behind the Restored remixes album? When I realized that 10 years was coming up on my first album, I wanted to do something different than just re-releasing a remastered edition or including some bonus tracks or something. I thought it would be interesting to get a fresh take on an old album and put some new life into something that many people never heard. I’ve always loved that album because it was before all the craziness started, and it was just me as an artist before ever setting foot on stage.
“I’ve had a lot of phases in my time: guitars, bass guitars, bleeps, dark, slow, techno, house.”
How would you describe your sound has evolved in the 10 years since the original Restore LP on Minus? I’ve had a lot of phases in my time: guitars, bass guitars, bleeps, dark, slow, techno, house. It’s not so much that I’m headed in a certain direction, but more like my circle is getting bigger and I’m trying more things that I didn’t do before. I still make tracks that sound like the ones I did in the ’90s, but I’m also making some brand new sounding material. I don’t have any pressure in the studio so it’s just whatever comes out of the machines and my brain at the time.
What inspired you to start the Items & Things imprint as a Minus sub-label with Magda and Troy Pierce in 2011? What’s your vision for the label? Originally, we would be traveling around and come across some great weird fun music that deserved to be released. At the time we were on Minus and the music didn’t really fit that sound or aesthetic. So we started the label out of a necessity to bring some cool tracks to light. Since leaving it’s become more of a platform for all our music, along with other special things we still find. Today it’s very different. With us three not meeting up as much as we would like to, it’s become less of a focus—but that’s something I want to change, of course. It’s very special to me regardless of how busy I am or how little money labels make these days.
What’s the first thing you’ll do after answering these questions? Continue recording new tracks, of course.
SP-X’s Moving Through Mirrors is the second triple vinyl release to land on Peter Van Hoesen‘s Time To Express label after the much lauded Receiver series. The EP is presented in three separate parts—part one was released on April 6, followed by parts two and three, which will be out on May 11 and June 8, respectively—with six tracks in total showcasing the stripped-back techno aesthetic that SP-X excels at. Propped up by booming hardware rhythms, metallic synth lines, and unearthly sound design, Moving Through Mirrors is an assured outing by a producer in total control of his dancefloor arsenal.
Out on May 11, part two of Moving Through Mirrors can be streamed in full via the player below.
A/S/L is an emerging LA based producer making the sort of sun-tinged house music you’d associate with the West Coast city. The Away from you EP will be the first release for A/S/L and will feature four varied house tracks including the one in question here, “3934 km.” “3934 km” is a thumping cut that opens with a looped female vocal sample and faint chords, before a raw, galloping rhythm lurches forward, providing the body for the rest of the track to ride on. Away from you will be released on June 16, with “3934 km” available as a free download below.
At the end of last month, Berlin’s Vakant label released Vortex To Unreason, the new EP from Italian producer Cesare Marchese (a.k.a. Cesare vs Disorder). The four-tracker features two new originals from Marchese, with the title track arriving with reworks from Romania’s Cristi Cons and fellow Italian Fango. Marchese endeavoured to present something unexpected and slightly different with Vortex, with his two tracks nodding to his lost feelings of the 90’s, and a time when electronic music was made for the mind and soul as much as it was for the club. “Vortex” is an amalgamation of modern day production and these lost feelings, with it’s skipping rhythm, heady atmospheres, and ravey synths working together to create an all-encompassing journey full of nostalgia. You can stream “Vortex” in full below, with the full EP available for purchase here.
Now that festival season is upon us, XLR8R is proud to announce its partnerships with some of the best events on the calendar. This year, we’re so far working with 13 world-class soirees from around globe, bringing you the news, the know-how, and the ins and outs of each event, as it happens. Our festival partners to date include Detroit’s Movement; Mutek Montreal; the Lyon based Nuits Sonores; Amsterdam’s Dekmantel; Piknic Electronik Montreal; Seattle’s Decibel; the forward-thinking arts and technology gathering Sónar; Fiber Festival; Montreal AIM Festival; and L.E.V. and Intonal, both of which have just finished.
We are also teaming up with select festivals on a series of collaborative podcasts featuring chosen headliners and up-and-comers. This special edition series kicks off today with XLR8R Podcast 385: Audiofly – Movement 2015 Festival Edition.
Yesterday, XLR8R‘s Mitch Strashnov gave Actress‘s DJ-Kicks mix a hearty thumbs-up, awarding it 8.5/10 and hailing its focus on “brilliant selections” over seamless beatmatching. Today, one of the exclusive tracks from the mix, GNESIS’s abstract, twinkling “Pear,” has been made available to stream in full via !K7’s Soundcloud page. “Pear” can be heard on the player below, while Actress’s DJ-Kicks mix is available now on !K7. Actress’s 2014 contribution to XLR8R‘s long-running podcast series, meanwhile, can still be streamed and downloaded here.
London-based experimentalist Luke Younger (a.k.a. Helm) has announced that he’ll release a new LP next month. Olympic Mess will be Younger’s fourth outing for Bill Kouligas’s PAN imprint, and is apparently an album “born of destructive practice, competing desires, and troubled optimism.” Musically it is said to be Younger’s response to “a period spent engaged with loop-based industrial music, dub techno, and balearic disco,” and was created using “an array of heavily processed samples, found sound and electroacoustics.” No previews are yet online, but the album’s cover art and tracklist is included below ahead of its June 15 release on PAN.
01. Don’t Lick The Jacket 02. I Exist In A Fog 03. Fluid Cloak 04. Outerzone 2015 05. Often Destroyed 06. Olympic Mess 07. Sky Wax (London) 08. Strawberry Chapstick 09. The Evening In Reverse 10. Sky Wax (NYC)
Luca Saporito and Anthony Middleton, together known as the Barcelona-based DJ and production team Audiofly, have been working together since 2002—and for most of that time, they’ve been firm favorites among the world’s right-minded clubbers. And why not? After all, they’ve released dancefloor-filling tunes on such esteemed labels as Get Physical, All Day I Dream, Moodmusic, Tsuba, and Rekids, just to name a few; their own label, Supernature, along with its Maison d’Etre imprint, boasts a discography that includes Jay Haze, Solomun, Martin Buttrich, Alex Niggemann, James Teej, Just Be and, of course, the Audiofly guys themselves; their Flying Circus parties are among nightlife’s go-to affairs; and they’re among the scene’s most in-demand spinners, with gigs at clubs and festivals spanning the globe In short, Saporito and Middleton are at the top of their game.
None of which is to say that the two are complacent: Unlike some clubland luminaries who seem to prefer a state of stasis over one of change, Audiofly isn’t afraid to evolve with the times. Over the years, the duo’s sound has gone from full-on, late-night, electronic-house thumpers to something a bit deeper, sleeker, dreamier and even later-night. It’s a sound that’s still Audiofly to the core, but it’s a progression that Saporito and Middleton attribute—at least in part—to playing in Romania, where they feel the crowd encourages experimentation rather than a reliance on formulas. You can get a taste of Audiofly’s current direction via this subtly hypnotic mix, which is taken from one of those Romanian gigs—and you can also sample their sonic wares when Audiofly hit Detroit to play this year’s Movement festival on Monday, May 25.
Video: Audiofly’s Luca Saporito and Anthony Middleton discuss their XLR8R podcast
