An early stream of the recently announced collaborative EP by Brooklyn-based artists Ital and Aurora Halal has surfaced. Streaming courtesy of Pitchfork Advance, the pair’s The Day After EP never stays confined to a single genre for too long, coming rife with droning loops of nebulous synths, club-ready percussion, and the occasional elongated venture into dense, ambient pads. Each production on the record transitions across galactic landscapes, making for an easy release to get caught adrift in.
The full stream of Ital’s and Aurora Halal’s The Day After EP can be found here, before the album drops on April 28 via Lovers Rock.
Having shared a download of the titular production off of his recently released Untitled EP for ASL Singles Club, Brooklyn-based resident of the monthly Broke City event series, Sleepyhead returns to XLR8R with the house jam, “All Alone.” Said to have been first crafted over two years ago only to see a release now, the dark-toned “All Alone” is a worthy addition to Sleepyhead’s repertoire of recent releases. Packing his track with ghostly vocal snippets and radiant blips, Sleepyhead’s spectral production is as brisk and spirited as it is haunting.
San Francisco producer Roche will return to the 100% Silk label with the four-track Stillhope EP in June. Having released his A Night at the Haç EP via the imprint in 2012, Roche’s upcoming effort will mark the Bay Area talent’s second release for the label. Again turning in a four-track affair for 100% Silk, the Stillhope EP is said to venture “further into [Roche’s] arcane hardware labyrinths,” resulting in a new serving of “mind-wired Pacific house.”
Before Stillhope sees its official release on June 3, a full stream of sprawling EP cut “The Medicine” can be heard below, where the complete tracklist for Roche’s upcoming 12″ has also been included.
01 Stillhope 02 The Medicine 03 Change 04 Theme For Ikaros
Following their documentary on the rise and fall of UK garage, Dazed and Channel 4 have released a new entry into their Music Nation series. Titled Berkshire Goes Balearic, the video tracks the historic spread of the Balearic sound throughout the UK. Over the course of the 20-plus-minute film, the doc emphasizes the influences that Boy’s Own publication and various UK Balearic clubs had on the expansion of the culture to locations such as Cardiff, Belfast, Manchester, and Berkshire. Furthermore, interviews with former Berkshire ravers reveal personal experiences with the shifting movement, and the change in DJ culture as a whole from an underground scene to a more commercial one.
Dazed’s latest Music Nation documentary can be watched in its entirety below.
Bueno Aires producer El Remolón has long been associated with the experimental side of the digital cumbia scene. On Selva—his new LP on ZZK, out today—he pushes himself further, this time exploring a whole range of sounds with the help of a considerable roster of guests pulled from the emerging alt-latino scene. “Nocturno” is the album’s teaser track, and it shows off a warmer side to El Remolón’s work that blends an insistent triplet shake with tricky Fender Rhodes playing and a chunky synthesized bassline. Put together, its four minutes offer an excellent soundtrack to a sun-soaked day (or simply a reminder that such days are possible).
Produced by Scoop DeVille, a new track from Fatima‘s forthcoming Yellow Memories LP is now available to stream. After having announced details of her upcoming album for Eglo earlier this month, the laid-back “Ridin Round (Sky High)” track is the first piece of new audio to surface from the record, which is set to drop on May 12. Built around a collection of clattering percussion and a set of lethargic, buzzing synthlines, “Ridin Round (Sky High)” is an expectedly soulful endeavor that finds generous layers of Fatima’s voice fittingly nicely with the stoney sway of Scoop DeVille’s production. Fatima’s newest single can be streamed in full below.
Taking much of its inspiration from the industrial rise and fall of the UK’s West Midlands region, where Mark E spent his formative years, the upcoming Product of Industry LP is said to showcase a harder edge to the remarkably consistent producer’s craft. Before that LP sees its full release next week via Ghostly’s Spectral Sound imprint, the nine-track affair is now available to stream in full.
“The music is grinding, continuous, heavy, relentless,” Mark E says of his forthcoming album, which is also said to be almost entirely produced on analog equipment. Still, Product of Industry does not present an unrecognizable Mark E, as beneath the more machine-minded sound palette, the man’s low-swung rhythms and keen ability for crafting chugging house workouts is still readily apparent. The time-tested UK producer/DJ’s sophomore LP will see its official release on April 28; in the meantime, the album can be streamed in its entirety below.
Last month, XLR8R debuted a new series in which we ask some of our favorite producers to select five essential pieces of gear from their current set-up. (Our first installment found Untold detailing the key bits from his new, analog-based live rig.) This time around, we’ve reached out to KiNK (a.k.a. Strahil Velchev), who will soon be releasing his debut full-length, ‘Under Destruction,’ via the Macro label. The Bulgarian producer has been wowing crowds with his gear-oriented live show for some time, but we wanted to know a little more about what he’s been working with at home; as such, we’ve asked Velchev to showcase a few of his favorite toys and tell us about his recent move into the addictive world of modular synths.
KiNK: I would like to show few music machines which I have either used a lot in my productions or am planning to use in my future work.
MFB Microzwerg I bought a lot of products by the German brand MFB, with the intention to use them for my typical live sets or to make an all-analog-based live techno project. Both ideas failed for many reasons, but I ended up having a special analog set-up, including a sequencer, a spring reverb, a compressor, and a few little synths. That inspired me to take a step back from the computer. Jamming with those machines led to recording an album. MFB Microzwerg V.1, the synth in the picture, is literally on every track on the album, because it was quite easy to get the sounds I was looking for. More than that, it made me discover new sounds, which is unusual for such a small, budget instrument. It became one of my all-time-favorite synths.
Leploop This is a very original little music machine. Made in Milano, it’s called Leploop. You can make a track or a live set with just this machine. There is a kick generator, a noise generator (which you can use for percussive elements), two oscillators (which you can control independently), a very unique bucket-brigade-based analog sequencer with digital triggers, many modulation options, and most importantly of all, unique tone. I used it on a couple of tracks from my upcoming album and I used to tour with it. There are two versions of the instrument; you see version 1 in the picture, it’s the one I used on my album. My friend said it’s like a wild horse that you can’t ride and that’s true in a way, but I prefer the sharper tone and the temper of it. I also bought version 2, which has a much better sequencer, many more modulation options, and a lot of CV and gate outputs. The sound is more natural and controlled, which can be an advantage or disadvantage, depending on what are you looking for. That’s why I decided to keep both for the moment.
The Ekdahl Moisturizer The Ekdahl Moisturizer is a voltage-controlled spring reverb and a multi-band filter. It has a very unique tone and look. I have few other spring reverbs, but this one, with the springs outside the box and a very dirty filter, is like a musical instrument. I love the way that it looks; it feels like it’s inviting me to make music—or noise. I used the Moisturizer in a very subtle way on my album, so there is still a lot of room for me to explore it in the future. However, it’s already a big part of my current sound.
Critter & Guitari Pocket Piano I was in San Francisco for few days in 2013. I found an amazing music store over there called Robotspeak. I really wanted to buy something, because they had very special instruments and the guy who runs it was nice and very helpful. I had to pick something small, so I could fit it in my handbag, and I took this Pocket Piano, made by Critter & Guitari. It’s a very simple digital synth with a few basic sounds, based on sine, square, and sawtooth waveforms with some frequency modulation; there is no filter. However, it sounds special, because of the few arpeggiator modes. When I switch it on, I suddenly come up with great melodies. I quite like the digital sound engine, but I can also send MIDI to another sound source. I still haven’t used it in my productions, but I play around with it very often. My friends react immediately when they see what I can do with it for a minute. I would like to record some music with it very soon.
Eurorack Modular This is the main part of my Eurorack-based modular system. I started it a year ago, just because I wanted to have a West Coast/Buchla style complex oscillator. My friend told me about someone who was selling a Make Noise Dual Prismatic Oscillator in Berlin. I bought it after midnight, on a dark street in Berlin, while I was on my way to a gig at the legendary Berghain/Panorama Bar. It was a rainy night, I jumped out of the taxi, gave the money to the guy, and he gave me a trashy box—I didn’t even check what was inside before I quickly jumped back into the car. It felt like I was buying something illegal, like drugs. At that time, I didn’t realize that I had bought the first dose of the most powerful drug! The rack got filled in pretty quickly, which was not the plan, and nothing can stop it from growing now. Currently, I have modules by Make Noise, TipTop Audio, Intellijel, Modcan, MFB, ADDAC, Circuit Abbey, and Doepfer. I’m also building a flat panel full of touch plates, but it’s not finished yet, so I decided not to take a picture of it. Recently, I used the system to make a remix of “Fever,” the new single from Audion and Tiga.
Opening with a wry synth pattern and a pulsing four-on-the-floor beat, C L N K‘s dire track “Fuck Hype”—taken off his forthcoming ANTI EP—is a suspenseful jaunt across low-growling static and shrill stabs of orchestral strings. C L N K forges a relentless assault of ominous sounds here, yet still finds space for miniscule traces of ambient sonics by way of extended synth pads which fill out the production’s sweeping palette of tones. The rest of C L N K’s “mutant dance music” tracks set to appear on ANTI can be heard when the EP drops on May 12 via Error Broadcast.
After dropping its impressive Containing a Thousand EP via R&S last month, Dublin duo Lakker has shared a new video for EP cut “Thermohaline.” Put together by Lakker member Dara Smith, the five-plus-minute clip focuses on a ceaselessly moving collection of abstract shapes which are restricted to only appearing in shades of grey and white. Akin to the pair’s tough electronic constructions, the video for “Thermohaline” is impressively detailed, with an array of shapes and patterns emerging from the clip’s foggy background.
