Perfume Advert “Lampers”

Producers Aaron Turner and Tom Brown (a.k.a. Perfume Advert) concern themselves with the slower ends of chugging house. “Lampers,” the title track from the pair’s forthcoming cassette for Montreal’s 1080p Collection label, slinks down around 110 bpm, utilizing a bulbous kick and fine layers of scratched surfaces and shuffling metallics to fashion a low-slung rhythm. On first listen, one is drawn to the subtle pattern of tuned chords which rides the track’s six-plus-minute run, but upon further inspection, the dense layering of background textures and their almost imperceptible manipulations may be what makes this track so engaging—especially when the floating, hazy rendering of those machine-made tones are consistently pulled back to earth by the weight of a languid kick drum. Perfume Advert’s Lampers will see a cassette and digital release on November 5.

Lampers

Laurel Halo Chance of Rain

Laurel Halo‘s remarkable debut full-length for Hyperdub, Quarantine, proved divisive upon its release last year, largely due to the album’s stark, abrasive treatment of the Brooklyn resident’s vocals. Since the release of that record though, Halo has shied away from using her voice, and her most recent EP, Behind the Green Door, eschewed the use of vocals entirely. Her full-length follow-up to Quarantine continues this trend, and finds the producer—on pace with her recent live sets—embracing a wonky sort of techno that falls somewhere between the sonic range she has been exploring under the King Felix moniker, and the dense, instrumental abstraction that has come to be expected from a Laurel Halo release.

Like the rest of Halo’s back catalog, there is a palpable sense of unease to Chance of Rain‘s off-kilter sonics. There’s very little to hold onto in the album, as beats come in and out of focus and congeal with intricate synthesizer patterns. This disorienting effect is not to suggest that the LP is lacking in melody; on the contrary, there’s plenty of melody on the album, but its use is rarely conventional and frequently beguiling. Take a track like album highlight “Chance of Rain,” which begins as an ambient techno workout reminiscent of early Warp recordings before Halo upends the tune’s structure with the introduction of a filmic but jarringly off-key keyboard line. Underneath all of this, the beat momentarily disappears before reappearing in a subtly altered form, only to decay and then re-emerge again in yet another guise. This restlessness and constant shifting of gears within a track’s parameters is a recurring feature of Chance of Rain, and serves to subvert Halo’s alignment with the techno influences she flirts with to such compelling effect. Elsewhere on the record, certain tracks channel the sparser, more bass-inclined recesses of UK club music, such as “Oneiroi,” which recalls the bare-boned techno of Night Slugs’ Club Constructions 12″ series, but is scuffed beyond all dancefloor utility. Similarly, tunes like “Serendip” and “Ainnome” allude to the gloss of much contemporary club music, but the steady momentum this implies is at every step undermined by the tunes’ stuttering rhythms and tripped-out synth layers. One of the album’s most memorable moments is “Thrax,” a tune which deploys an ear-worming melody that seems to push up against the track’s agitated, brittle beats. The track is typical of Halo’s recent approach; it’s restless, intricate, and relentlessly exploratory.

Chance of Rain will likely prove less controversial than Quarantine, but by no means is it a less challenging record. While Quarantine‘s unadorned vocals alluded to a post-human sense of alienation, Chance of Rain sounds positively inhuman. It is cold and in many ways inhospitable music, but it’s music that’s bursting with ideas and a refreshing willingness to embrace complexity at a time when so much dance music is going back to basics.

Orphan Swords “Caim”

Sound experimentalist and founder of the Idiosyncratics label Yannick Franck works with Maze as industrial-slanted techno duo Orphan Swords. Featured here, “Caim” is a new track from the pair which arrives before its upcoming three-track tape is released sometime next month. The single is made up of a screeching, splitting bell tone that wavers above locked grooves and dubby synth undulations; the whole thing is pushed along by a sterile book-kat beat. The grinding sounds and whirling blasts of white noise position the track directly in the realm of acts like Sandwell District and Richie Hawtin’s digressive and hypnotizing Plastikman moniker.

Orphan Swords – Caim

Mr. Beatnick The Synthetes Trilogy

It’s unlikely that Mr. Beatnick often finds himself short on ideas. Though his output has not been particularly prolific over the past few years, the Londoner’s productions have consistently been given free reign to exist just about anywhere on the spectrum of disco-flecked, sample-based, acid-tinged deep house—the sort that has more in common with outfits like Black Jazz Consortium or Metro Area than the bass-focused variants favored by many of his UK counterparts. Despite his diverse tastes, the Synthetes Trilogy is a rather cohesive effort. Built from Mr. Beatnick’s three-EP series (Synthetes, Sun Goddess, and Savannah) that began back in 2011, along with a handful of new productions, the 12-track long-player helps connect the dots between the producer’s varied styles.

On the surface, Mr. Beatnick’s music isn’t complicated—and that’s not a bad thing. Taking occasional ventures off into particularly jazz-flecked or space-destined territory, his productions concern themselves with house music in some of its most classic forms, utilizing what (or at least what sounds like) analog machines, soul-drenched samples, and plenty of inventive percussion to accomplish the task. Still, The Synthetes Trilogy never feels overrun with vintage references; Mr. Beatnick seems to have simply decided on a similar set of tools as his predecessors in order to make his current productions. This decision likely puts the extra-deep sub-bass and otherworldly sonic structures that mark much of the UK’s current club music out of his reach, but it also helps make his work distinct.

Using this formula, Mr. Beatnick has landed on some very fertile mixtures throughout his run of EPs, and those choice cuts again make for noteworthy appearances on this collection. The opening “Synthetes” and “Symbiosis” sound particularly Metro Area-inspired, with lush layers of strings floating atop skipping drum-machine rhythms and analog basslines that seem to percolate from the bottom up. Mr. Beatnick’s knack for playful bass synths is another quality that comes into better focus on this collection; whether he is crafting sparse, moody cuts like “Beneath The Reef” and “Waning Moon” (one of the LP’s new efforts), sun-kissed, filter-tweaked house on “Sun Goddess,” or accelerated spurts of tension-filled hardware music on “Savannah,” the tracks’ restless basslines consistently provide an essential momentum to each production. Striking a balance between having active low end, but not being too busy, can be a difficult task, but Mr. Beatnick proves to be up for the challenge and in the end, this helps his productions stand out.

In truth, The Synthetes Trilogy‘s one downfall may be that it runs a little long. Having chosen to switch out a handful of tracks from the original EP series in order to include four new efforts, the record ultimately offers 13 tracks, though many of its new productions (with the exception of the aforementioned “Waning Moon”) seem a bit unnecessary—especially the closing, break-heavy “Never Dies,” which comes out of nowhere while operating well above 140 bpm. In the end though, The Synthetes Trilogy fares better as a collection than as an album in the traditional sense, and it still proves that no matter what form it is presented in, Mr. Beatnick’s work over the last three years has certainly been worthy of exploration.

The Lowdown – This Week’s XLR8R Top 10 with Kyle Hall, Four Tet, Knxwledge, and More

Throughout the week, a whole lot of material gets posted here on XLR8R. And while we know—and love—that some hardcore readers will eagerly pour over every single news story, interview, podcast, video, and MP3 download that appears on the site, we also realize that for most people, it’s impossible to see everything, which means that some quality XLR8R content is likely to get missed in the hustle and bustle of everyone’s daily lives. In the interest of making it easier for everyone to catch up, every Friday we present The Lowdown, a weekly wrap-up of the top 10 tidbits from our site.

1. This week’s XLR8R podcast was put together by jungle revivalist and pirate-radio enthusiast Special Request (a.k.a. UK techno veteran Paul Woolford).

2. XLR8R took at trip to the Netherlands for the annual Amsterdam Dance Event, and our review of the festival/conference detailed some of its most memorable moments.

3. We published an in-depth profile of hardworking LA beatmaker Knxwledge, who claims to have made “half a million” beats.

4. Given that his School Daze collection dropped this week, we assembled a list of five things everyone should know about gay electronic pioneer Patrick Cowley.

5. The final installment of our four-part Innovators mix series debuted this week, and it was put together by one of Detroit’s brightest talents, Kyle Hall.

6. Fresh of the release of his debut album, Daniel Avery offered up a provocative new video for LP cut “All I Need.”

7. Even though he just released a new LP, prolific UK producer Four Tet shared both a new remix of album track “Kool FM” and new song this week. The latter is called “Gillie Amma, I Love You,” and it will appear on the forthcoming BOATS compilation.

8. We’ve been loving FACT’s ongoing Against the Clock video series, and the latest episode featured the veteran musicmakers of Mouse on Mars hashing out a track in 10 minutes.

9. Machinedrum has been a busy man as of late, and his active streak continued this week with the debut of a brand-new mix for Resident Advisor.

10. Our Downloads section was as active as ever this week, and the most popular selection we shared came from Siberian-born, California-based producer Gladkill, who offered up the seductive “What Goes On” as a free giveaway.

An expanded version of the The Lowdown is also available via a weekly email newsletter. Those interested in an even more in-depth round-up of XLR8R content, including a complete listing of all the free downloads we’ve offered in the past seven days, should sign up by entering their email address below.

Subscribe to the XLR8R Lowdown

Sano “Cotoneate”

Colombian producer Sano is a few days away from dropping his self-titled debut LP via Cómeme, a label helmed by pan-Latin dance music innovator Matias Aguayo. The vibrant “Cotoneate” serves as our first taste of Sano, bringing waves of modulated synths and an unabashedly funky bassline which complements the heavily percussive four-on-the-floor nicely. Like most things to come from the Cómeme camp, Sano’s new track effortlessly comes together as a multi-genre hybrid, one that is squarely aimed at the dancefloor and—perhaps most importantly of all—is just plain fun. Sano is set to see a release on Monday, October 28.

Cotoneate

Physical Therapy to Inaugurate New Label with EP

New Jersey DJ/producer Physical Therapy has announced that he’ll soon launch his own label, called Allergy Season, with the release of a new EP. Non-Drowsy comes shortly after his recent Yes, I’m Ecstatic record for Fifith Wall, and much like that release, Physical Therapy’s new EP is said to feature “genre-free, highly emotive dance music.” Filled with a flurry of dreamscapes and dazed textures, Non-Drowsy will make the first release from Allergy Season on November 19, when it drops as a free digital download. Until then, its artwork and tracklist can be viewed below.

01. 4:21
02. Huff
03. Leonia
04. Huminbeen
05. Coffee
06. Smoov
07. d.T.

Altered Natives Announces New Alias, Gives Away Mixtape

“Take a shortcut through a gap in a corrugated iron fence in a North London scrap yard, across the train tracks, and out through the dark disused tunnel, third railway arch on the left and you’ll find the back door to my surgery.” This is how unpredictable UK producer Altered Natives has elected to introduce his new alias: Doctor Cockbloctopus. Well, that and a new free mixtape, of course. In the somewhat cryptic press release which accompanies the new mix, the longstanding producer explains that his new handle has grown from his love of hip-hop, while continuing to incorporate elements from the many strains of UK dance music. Still, as the press release further explains, “This project is cultured against my work as Altered Natives, and is completely non house/techno-oriented, instead stripping back to the key sounds which maybe even went [on] to inspire elements in those movements.” Doctor Cockbloctopus’s introductory mixtape (which boasts a whopping 21 tracks) can be streamed in the player below, and downloaded for free here.

01 New Receptionist intro
02 Life Is
03 Cockbloctodamus
04 Resent Validate
05 Killing Kings
06 8 Hand Pussy Pop
07 DOOM Hill
08 Faulty Lightbitch
09 Desolate (on the couch)
10 The Heart
11 Pop Bottles (Tonys Theme)
12 Cumbug
13 Unconnected
14 Wannabeez
15 Fresh Start
16 Tequilas Theme
17 The Legend of Wong Fei Hung vs Doctor Cockbloctopus
18 Money Shower Pussy Power
19 Popcorn
20 Final Diagnosis
21 Myfanwy’s Opinion Outro

Video: Guido “Green-Eyed Monster (feat. Emma-Lou)”

One of Bristol’s renowned “purple” dubstep producers, Guido has just shared a video for his new “Green-Eyed Monster” single, a tune which arrives before the release of his sophomore recordMoods of Future Joy on November 4 via Tectonic. The piece places featured singer Emma-Lou directly in its focus, as Guido works out some Timbaland-esque production techniques for extremely emotive results. In a dark room, the vocalist sings out about jealousy and heartbreak, changing between different outfits as the video (and her anger) progresses.

Check Out Soul Clap’s and Wolf + Lamb’s B2B Mix from ADE

During the massive Amsterdamn Dance Event gathering last week (our full review of which can be read here), frequent collaborators and regular chums behind the decks Soul Clap and Wolf + Lamb went B2B throughout Pulselocker‘s Crew Love night. Now, two hours of the four-piece’s B2B set are available to stream. As to be expected, both Soul Clap and Wolf + Lamb use much of the set to navigate through the druggier ends of slow-burning, soul-drenched house and funk. Doing so with an experienced touch, the crews even successfully venture into some traditional African music for a few moments before pulling the set back into more familiar territory. The full Soul Clap vs. Wolf + Lamb mix can be streamed below, and those interested in grabbing a copy of the entire recording of the special ADE night (which also featured live performances from PillowTalk and No Regular Play) can do so by signing up for a trial with Pulselocker here.

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