Months after the announcement of his forthcoming LP, Brooklyn-based producer Phaseone has shared two new tracks from If I Tell U. Below, the dreamy, hip-hop-infused “Bianca” and “Arsenal Magnolia” tunes can be heard before the Adult Swim-associated Williams Street label drops Phaseone’s new album on May 7.
The next release from rising Scottish duo Clouds is less than a week away, with the forthcoming Man Out of Dubs EP (artwork above) set to drop on April 30 via Brooklyn’s fledgling Fifth Wall label. The imprint’s fast-paced release schedule is only matched by the driving techno with which the label has concerned itself, and this new EP appears to be no different. Pulled from the tail end of Man Out of Dubs is this remix from Fifth Wall co-owner Divvorce, who somewhat quells the rougher and more unpredicatable textures of Clouds’ original track into more subterranean depths. Before Clouds’ upcoming EP sees an official release, a preview of the six-track effort—which also includes a remix from the other Fifth Wall label head, Hound Scales—can be heard after the jump.
Nottingham-based producer Kamal Joory (a.k.a Geiom) has long been one of the most unfairly overlooked electronic artists operating out of the UK. For over a decade now, he’s been producing tunes that generally manage to maintain a proper dancefloor edge whilst always cultivating an element of sonic peculiarity that has set him apart from prevailing trends in UK dance music. This latest release—for soon to be inactive Brighton label Well Rounded—is no exception. It sees him teaming up with vocalist Terrible Shock to create a full-on floor filler rooted in classic grime and funky, albeit one built around enough creative synth work and rhythmic weirdness to make it feel resolutely forward-thinking.
After the adventurous computerized textures of last year’s impressive Black Screen LP, “2-4-6” feels like a bit of a return to more straightforward dancefloor territory for Joory. At its heart, the track is built around the familiar percussive drive of UK funky and a thick bassline that wouldn’t sound out of place at any modern grime rave. Beneath this backbone, however, lay numerous layers of peculiarly mechanized instrumentation—namely, relentless synth lines that rise and fall from within a chaotic patchwork of rapid hats and metallic percussive noises. Terrible Shock’s fractured vocals also work well, providing disjointed intermissions to the track’s hectic rhythms whenever he throws in intermittent dancefloor commands or summons lines of carnival-ready whistles.
On the b-side, Finnish producer Desto offers up a remix that strips the track down to a minimal drum-machine rhythm. He swaps the grime synths of the original for a booming 808-style sub and leaves the percussive lines of whistles and cowbells to handle the melody. It’s certainly a clever reworking, and one which provides a nice offset to the propulsive chaos of the original while leaving plenty of space and utilizing a hypnotic sort of repetition.
Today, London DJ/producer and Lost Codes label boss Visionist (a.k.a. Louis Carnell), who featured in our Bubblin’ Up series about a year ago, dropped some new material in an hour-long, bass-heavy mix. Stepping up to the decks for Dis Magazine, Visionist laid down tunes from the likes of Zomby, Fatima Al Qadiri, Kowton, and Total Freedom, as well as a few cuts lifted from his as-yet-unreleased I’m Fine EP for Lit City Trax. The artist’s Only Eye mix and its tracklist can be found below, but the full audio-visual experience intended for this DJ set can only be found here.
Dentist – OHD#
Visionist – More Pain
Fatima Al Qadiri – Hip Hop Spa (Nguzunguzu Remix)
Zomby – Digital Fauna
Dot Rotten – Third Eye
MssingNo – Casoxy 2(5)
Visionist – P.W.O.A.W.
Mr Mitch – Nico
Acre – I Lost Everything
LOL Gulrz x 5kin And Bone5 – Love You
Fantastic Mr Fox – If I
?&? – Temptation
Zomby – Riding With Death
MssingNo – Brandy
Visionist – Patience
Shy One – Black Widow
Visionist – Stickz & Stonez
Kowton – Sketch 1
Filter Dread – Burner
Acre – Malta Kano
Visionist – Restless
Visionist – Only Eye
Ciara/Young Dot (Total Freedom Edit) – Promise/Real Talk
Zomby – Haunted
Dot Rotten ft Fugi – Best of Me
Biggie Dan – DTM Gome Mad VIP
??? – Bone
Dot Rotten – The Circle
DJ Oddz (Visionist – Crying Angels Mix) – Champion remix/vip
This new visual clip which just arrived from UK outfit Mount Kimbie and director Leif Podhajsky could best be described as a whacked-out, handmade iTunes visualizer that took one too many hits of DMT. Maybe the video for “Made to Stary” is best viewed with headphones on and a tab of acid on the tongue, but Dominic Maker’s and Kai Campos’ linear, beat-driven track pairs well enough with the vibrant colors and mirrored patterns seen here to give even the sober viewer a bit of a trip. Before Mount Kimbie’s second LP, Cold Spring Fault Less Youth, touches down on May 28 via Warp, its new video can be seen below.
Earlier this week, Hyperdub boss Kode9 gave the world a full stream of the a-side from his forthcoming 12″, “Xingfu Lu,” and in another fit of generosity, has also opted to share its b-side tune. “Kan” is almost as equally restless and juke-touched as its counterpart, with plenty of default snares and hollowed-out percussion—which, apparently, is a sample of Kode9 “opening a can of Irn Bru, pouring it in a glass of ice, and hitting the glass with a fork”—cracking in time with the heavy rhythm and stuttering melodies. Below, the track is available to hear in full, and a brief interview about the longstanding DJ/producer’s new tune can be read over on Pitchfork before the single drops on April 29.
As the brothers of UK production duo Disclosure ramp up for the release of their debut full-length album, Settle, on June 3, all sorts of fresh sights and sounds have continued to trickle in. The most recent piece is a new music video for Guy and Howard Lawrence’s latest single, “You & Me (feat. Eliza Doolittle).” Kicking off with the iconic “Parental Advisory” stamp, the clean-looking clip starts out innocently enough, as we watch a boy and girl seemingly travel around Europe together, enjoying the landscapes, bars, culture, and so on. Then, as a couple is wont to do, things get a little tense in parts and a little steamy in other parts. The whole thing can be seen in the player below.
Every Thursday morning, we sing the praises of Nick Hook, and though we may be in danger of sounding like a broken record, our resident advice columnist is simply an incredible resource. Regardless of the topic, be it music, DJing, production, gear, romance, travel, fashion, or just about anything else, the good doctor almost certainly has something valuable to say. That’s why readers in search of a little wisdom should send questions to doctornick@xlr8r.com—after all, Doctor Nick is here to help.
Hi. It’s been a busy week. I’ve been back in the studio with Killer Mike and El-P. I also had an awesome night at the new Red Bull Music Academy space in New York. It looks fantastic, and I spent some time with fellow alumni Salva, Jesse Boykins III, and Brenmar. It’s gonna be an amazing month of May in New York. Kudos to everyone for working so hard so that we can enjoy such things.
I usually write an intro, but I wrote half of this before/during the studio session with El-P and Mike yesterday and then the question kinda answered itself. So, we will do an outro this week. But send questions. doctornick@xlr8r.com. We need ’em. Always.
Hi Doctor Nick,
Before you ever started getting paid for your music and being a professional, were there any moments where you felt like you just wanted to quit music? Well, maybe not quit music entirely, but did you ever feel like producing music professionally just wasn’t going to work out?
I’ve been producing electronic dance music for years and love it to death, but at times I feel like I don’t ever get any payoff for all the work I put in. My music isn’t reaching many people and I don’t ever DJ, although I’m beginning to learn, so I’m not sure how to get it out there. Anyways, I’ve just been having some hefty writer’s block lately and have been feeling uninspired as of late.
Riley
Yes. Absolutely. 100%. I’ve felt this way many times for many reasons.
I always had like six other options, just in case music didn’t work. I went to college and I always had like four jobs. I was working for a record label, handing out flyers, helping promoters, DJing. Growing up in St.Louis, barely anyone “made it’ in music, and I really never planned on that happening either. It was just a hobby on the side. Honestly, I’m back in St. Louis today to try and sell a house that I bought a year before I moved to New York. At the time, I thought I was going to live my entire life in that place.
I really always thought this whole music thing was temporary. I worked at a sake bar and I still kinda do now. Music just seemed too fantasy-based to actually be real, but I’ve worked hard enough and put myself into the position of being in the right place that now I think it’s going to last.
It hasn’t always been like this, and there have been some hard moments. My parents never thought I would amount to anything. After graduating college, I had no idea what I was supposed to do. I got dropped from a major label and was still broke. I’m still broke after every other tour. I’ve ruined relationships. The list goes on and on. To this day, sometimes quitting and just getting a regular job kinda seems alluring in many ways. It’s hard living life with no health insurance, no stability, the simultaneous connect and disconnect of friendship, and all the other bad things that go along with this game.
Maybe you should take a break from writing music. See what else makes you feel things. It’s not like that part of your identity is going to go away just because you aren’t doing it for a while. Careers can change, your role in music could change—maybe you’d be a great teacher and could inspire someone in a different way. Make a bunch of mixtapes and develop the DJ side. Can you help engineer other people’s stuff and help it pay off for them? In exchange, maybe you get publishing money or studio fees. What is your goal for a payoff? Do you even need a payoff? Isn’t just making dope stuff its own payoff?
Anyways, back to my intro. Right now, I’m back at my parents house in St. Louis, but yesterday, after I finished most of this column and had an awesome day in the studio, none other than Big Boi from Outkast rolled into the studio to do a guest verse for Mike and El, at my studio, with me engineering. Needless to say, when I was 14, Southernplayalisticadillacmuzik was my favorite record on Earth besides The Chronic. Meeting and working with Big Boi was surreal, to say the least. More importantly, it reaffirmed all belief I have in doing this. The great moments are worth far more than the ones that make you question it all.
Okay. That’s it. xxxxxx
Hi, Doctor Nick! appears every Thursday on XLR8R. Do you have a question for Doctor Nick? Please submit your inquires to doctornick@xlr8r.com. Nick Hook can help you.
18-year-old UK producer and Bondax protege Karma Kid (a.k.a. Sam Knowles) made some serious waves last year, most notably with his “It’s Always” single via the Justus label (not to mention the “Lust, Love” freebie he gave XLR8R). This month, he returns with follow-up single “In My Arms” (artwork above), and we have an exclusive download of a remix of the track from Maths Time Joy. In his capable hands, the London artist’s version of “In My Arms” takes on an atmospheric bent, with a layer of plucked strings and chimes slightly downplaying the vibe from the banging original track.
When XLR8R spoke to Bristol-based producer Jacob Martin (a.k.a. Hodge) back in January (as part of our Bubblin’ Up Weekfeature on Bristol’s new generation of producers), he described his work with Outboxx—the house duo consisting of himself and Matt Lambert—as “all pretty much jam based” and about “just having fun.” It’s unsurprising then, that it’s precisely that vibe that comes across on the pair’s debut album for Idle Hands. The nine-track collection is rough around the edges and perhaps a little unrefined, but at the same time, it’s absolutely packed with deep and genuinely infectious grooves. The two producers play on the tried and tested moves of vintage house without ever descending into outright nostalgia, and they do so in a loose sort of way that yields results which feel natural and are—above all—immensely likeable.
Broadly speaking, the record can be divided up into two halves, the first of which is loaded with more straightforward, floor-focused house jams, while the latter is a little looser and sees the pair bending genre barriers. To Outboxx’s credit, the duo balances these two sides to the album skillfully—when the producers set their sights on the dancefloor, they do so in a seemingly spontaneous way that avoids feeling forced, while their later genre experiments remain rooted in the solid grooves that give the album its momentum.
Lead single “Sunshine Mills” is the album’s most upfront and direct moment, but it’s also one of the finest things the pair has released to date. In terms of its compositional elements, it doesn’t deviate massively from the revivalist house formula that’s a current mainstay of UK clubs—the retro drum machines, soulful vocals, and percussive bassline are all present—yet everything comes together in a pleasantly unrushed, meandering sort of way. Where other producers might throw in an ultra-precise breakdown for maximum dancefloor effect, Outboxx lets its rhythmic grooves unfold in a relaxed and more engaging manner. It’s this trick that’s deployed, albeit in a slightly less direct style, throughout the majority of the album’s front end. “Jewel City” is a brilliantly slow-paced collage of hazy Chicago-house sounds that gradually builds into a wonderfully laid-back summer jam. “All The Right Moves,” meanwhile, layers reverb-covered vintage synths and understated vocals over a swaggering funk bass riff to create another of the LP’s standout offerings.
By contrast, each of the tracks on the album’s latter half sees Martin and Lambert subtly inverting this formula in one way or the other. “Lost Soul”—which features vocalist Naomi Jeremy—is similar in make-up to the tracks that preceded it, but finds the pair swapping out the Chicago-house sounds for the shuffling hats and soulful textures of classic garage. Both “Withdrawal” and the brilliantly titled “Thrashing Groovster,” on the other hand, strip back the layers to move things into more ambient, minimal territory. It’s “Withdrawal” that proves to be the highlight of the two though; with its brooding bass hits, short bursts of metallic drums, and gorgeously melancholy piano outro, it injects a welcome moment of darkness amidst the largely upbeat mood of the album. Finally, “My Destination” rounds the LP off on a solid note by creating a dense coda out of swelling, downbeat synths and delayed percussion.
Ultimately, it’s the prevailing sense of loose, jam-session experimentation that gives Outboxx its winning charm, but it’s also very occasionally the LP’s undoing. Opening track “Home,” for example, feels DIY to the extent of coming across a little bit like a roughly mixed demo. Jeremy again appears on vocals, but her soulful pipes don’t quite gel with the music for reasons that are difficult to actually pinpoint. Still, while Outboxx might occasionally feel a little unpolished, and more like an act working through various experiments than a finely tuned and fully formed piece, the end results are likeable and genuinely hard not to enjoy.
