Next week, Hague-based artist Christelle Gualdi (a.k.a. Stellar Om Source) is releasing her first full-length in three years via on-point Brooklyn label RVNG, but has unveiled a full stream of the music prior to then. In contrast to the producer’s earlier self-released CDRs, which were largely beatless exercises in cosmic synth music, Joy One Mile finds Gualdi exploring the rhythmic structures and sonic possibilities of early Detroit techno. Like lead single “Elite Excel,” the record marries skeletal electro beats to cerebral synth workouts, and makes for very compelling listening. Joy One Mile will drop on June 11; in the meantime, you can listen to the whole thing over at Pitchfork.
French producer Raziek spends the better half of his remix of “Black Ice” coyly introudcing elements and patiently building to the real meat of the production. The wait is surely worth the payoff when, just past the two-minute mark, Raziek unleashes an irresistible bassline that jumps and glides around the mechanical skip of the tune’s garage-indebted rhythms. Raziek’s remix comes to us from the recent Black Ice EP by Dizzy Womack (a beatsmith formerly known as DJ Dizzy), which is out now via Top Billin and can be previewed after the jump.
Brooklyn producer and Mixpak label head Dre Skull was invited to sit on the blue coach down at Red Bull Music Academy‘s New York headquarters, where he gave a lecture during its recent second session late last month. The 90-minute discussion—which covers the multi-talented artist’s career from first reaching out to Jamaican vocalists all the way to his current projects with Popcaan, Beenie Man, and (no shit) Snoop Lion—is now available to watch in full. In addition, the Brooklyn resident discusses his experience running a label in the current music industry and shares the stories behind a number of tracks from across his exceptional career. Dre Skull’s entire RBMA lecture can be watched below.
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A few months back, it was announced that legendary NYC house DJ/producer Todd Terry would be re-launching his classic Freeze imprint. The first round of releases saw reissues of classic tunes from Terry’s Sax and House of Gypsies monikers, and the producer has just announced a third release in the form of a selection of classic tracks from his Sound Design project. The four tracks included on the 12″ showcase a funky, hip-hop-indebted side of Terry’s hugely influential sound, and with the help of Clone, will be pressed onto vinyl for the first time in over a decade on June 18. Previews of the vintage tunes can be streamed in the player below.
Montreal-based musician/producer CFCF is set to release a new EP next month, and has shared the forthcoming record’s first single, “Camera,” for stream/download. The eight-track Music for Objects EP will drop on July 8 via Dummy, and is said to act as a companion to last year’sExercises EP. The record will also purportedly find CFCF attempting to “translate the essence of everyday physical objects into sound,” hence track titles such as “Glass,” “Bowl,” “Keys,” and the like. “Camera” can be streamed and downloaded below, where the tracklist and artwork for Music for Objects can also be found.
Brighton DJ/producer Leon Vynehall has had a busy 2013 so far, releasing a 12″ via Well Rounded Housing Project, a collaborative EP with Christian Piers as Laszlo Dancehall, and also contributing to the XLR8R podcast series. Next, the bass-minded patron of deep house will drop a new 12″ via Will Saul’s Aus label on June 10, but has opted to stream both tracks ahead of its release. On the a-side, “Brother” is a shuffling, garage-influenced slice of classic house, with the sharp piano stabs that are quickly becoming a trademark of Leon Vynehall’s distinctive style. “Sister,” on the other hand, takes things in a deeper direction, with a rolling bassline and a sighing, soulful vocal sample. Both tracks can be heard via the player below.
To celebrate its milestone of 100 cataloged releases, Dutch label Delsin has announced plans to release a compilation which will be stretched across five 12″ EPs featuring various aritsts—alternatively available as a single box set or a 15-track CD. Label head Marsel van der Wielen offered some insight on the release series, saying, “With this compilation, I try a bit to go back to the core of Delsin, to showcase the more soulful but still raw techno sounds from a selection of key artists who best represent the label.” The first EP will be 100DSR/VAR1, and features contributions from Gerry Read (whose new record we recently reviewed) Claro Intelecto, and Unbroken Dub. Further installments of Delsin’s celebratory release series will offer tunes from the likes of Delta Funktionen, Conforce, and Redshape, among others. Snippets from 100DSR/VAR1 can be heard below, before it’s released on June 24.
a1. Claro Intelecto – Fighting The Blind Man b1. Gerry Read – Granny Bag b2. Unbroken Dub – Spacing
Following the recent celebration of Eglo‘s fourth anniversary in London, label co-founder Floating Points has marked the ocassion by putting together a new mix comprised solely of, well, soul 45s. Beginning with the tune which inspired and was sampled on Justin Timberlake’s “Suit & Tie,” Floating Points rolls through 90 minutes of retro soul and classic R&B 7″s simply because he can. The full mix can be streamed via the player below and downloaded for free here.
Brazilian producer Pazes is set to drop his debut EP for boutique LA imprint Time No Place, and has sent over an exclusive cut from the record. While still retaining traces of the producer’s roots in the post-Dilla beat scene, “Frozen” features vocals from the Istanbul-based artist Biblo and evokes more of a back-room, ambient-techno vibe. Pazes’ track is structured around skeletal beats and twinkling synths, over the top of which sit Biblo’s dream-pop vocals wrapped around some serious layers of spectral haziness. The rest of Sleeping Doll is set to drop on June 21.
On the surface, it would seem quite easy to do what Oscar Powell does. Layer some disjointed drum loops—preferably swiped from a no-wave record—with bursts of noise and static, throw in some dissonant synthesizer and maybe a snarky spoken word sample, and one ought to have a facsimile of one of his tracks. The London-based producer has a formula, no doubt, but it is far more complicated than it appears. Powell‘s tracks are surely minimalist in focus, but are also, as he has attested in interviews, subject to meticulous editing. Both no wave and the industrial techno he has sometimes been grouped with are known for frenetic, one-take approaches. Powell, meanwhile, is an expert in control, and his sound harkens to jungle’s tensile rhythms, or maybe even a spartan version of microhouse. Earlier records obfuscated these charms, sounding muddier and more inert than the untitled, studiously funky EP he released on The Death of Rave earlier in the year. Fizz, his first 12″ for Liberation Technologies, is every bit as essential a listen, if not more.
The title track zooms around a mainline of cranky Suicide-esque organ, globular pulses, and odd guitar twangs, but the kickdrum is its engine. Powell pads it so it smacks with every hit, and eventually tumbles it over itself, thundering along with a physicality that is so blunt it virtually drowns out the track’s teeming, almost concrète background detailing. Any listener who has ever felt their body riddled by a machine-gun jack pattern but now finds standard jacking house to be a cliché ought to be involuntarily punching the air on this one. “Wharton Tiers On Drums” presumably samples the titular drummer, best known for his work in Theoretical Girls. It uses a similar sound set as “Fizz,” but is less immediate, meandering through a loopy background as Powell’s imaginary drummer and bassist struggle to synchronize. A snare clambers into the mix, there is a voice as if a bandleader has just shuddered an order, and everything shuts down. And then the artist’s rhythmic genius is at work again, as his drums lock into a chugging, bulldozer thrust before melding with a high, ghostly tone and synths that crackle and gurgle like they’re short-circuiting. “Beats” is of course a bonus beat, but it nonetheless has all the chiseled force of its companions. These pieces course with visceral energy. For the moment, Powell is totally peerless, and while he references bygone eras, his tracks represent the cutting edge of precision-engineered body music.
