Long-running Canadian music festival MUTEK will return for its 14th year this May, and has teased that auspicious occasion today by unveiling the first wave of artists set to grace the nearly week-long Montreal event. Veteran artist Matthew Herbert (pictured above) will offer three performances: a DJ set as Wishmountain, a unique live performance of the controversial One Pig album, and an improvisational piece based on a 10-second recording taped by a photojournalist in Libya during its civil war. Cologne-based label Kompakt will be celebrating its 20th anniversary at MUTEK with a set by label co-head Michael Mayer (and perhaps a few surprises, too). Other artists announced to perform between May 29 and June 2 are Detroit techno icon Robert Hood, 3024 boss Martyn, John Talabot (the man behind our favorite release of 2012), dub-techno experimentalist Andy Stott, Juju & Jordash, French electro-funk lover Onra, Jamie Lidell, and others. Early bird tickets for MUTEK 2013 are available here, and you can peep the rest of the festival’s prelimiary lineup here.
Budding New York producer Anthony Naples announced today that he’ll soon launch his own imprint, Proibito, with a release from the similarly experimental house artist Huerco S., operating under the moniker Royal Crown of Sweden. Set to drop on April 4, the R.E.G.A.L.I.E.R. EP is said—according to Juno Plus—to find Huerco S. using the four-track record as a means to explore the “play between drum machines and four-bar samples.” You can stream clips of the three original tracks and a remix from L.I.E.S. affiliates Bookworms and Jason Letkiewicz (a.k.a. Steve Summers), along with their friend Lori, below. And if you missed it last month, we suggest you take a few moments to read over our Bubblin’ Up Week feature exploring the burgeoning world of “Outsider House”—which featured both Anothony Naples and Huerco S., among others—here.
A1 Vänern A2. Vänern (Bookworms, Steve Summers, and Lori Mix) B1 Vättern B2 Mälaren
Today, we’re premiering London producer Blacksmif‘s avant-garde visual piece for “How the Fly Saved the River.” Directed by video artist Markus Lehtonen, the clip shows computerized, aquatic landscapes transforming into glacial ice crystals that eventually melt together into an aqueous feminine formation. “How the Fly Saved the River”—which Brighton-based imprint Blah Blah Blah recently released—offers heavy doses of low-end frequencies and simmering, dancefloor-ready rhythms along with some requisite vocal samples. The whole package is unquestionably captivating, and marks the artist born Yemi Olagbaiye as a producer to watch this year, especially seeing as how he recently graced Boiler Room and will soon release another single with Jabru via Paradise Club on March 11.
It’s only surprising that Glasgow beatmaker Soosh is just now releasing his debut album because we feel like he’s been ready to do just that since we first heard his rickety, hip-hop-informed productions in 2011. He’s always worked with like-minded peers, remixing the likes of Shlohmo and being remixed by Brainfeeder affiliate Lapalux, and managed to carve out a unique voice in the over-crowded realm of the “beat scene.” But maybe that’s why it has taken so long for Colour is Breathe to surface: The artist born Soroosh Khavari seems to have taken as much time as he needed to continue honing his work in order to set himself apart from the pack. We got our first taste of that work earlier this month, when Soosh gave us the premiere of “The Way You (feat. Carmel Khavari),” and now, we’re treated to an exclusive stream of the entirety of Colour is Breathe. You can listen to that album before its release on February 25 via Error Broadcast, after the jump.
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Next week, the Darkroom Dubs label will drop Darkroom Dubs Vol. 3, a mix CD compiled and pieced together by the label heads in Silicone Soul, partly to celebrate 10 years as an active imprint. Pulled from the mix is this Robag Wruhme rework of Extrawelt‘s “Neuland”—the original of which appeared on Darkroom Dubs back in 2010. The veteran producer/jock takes Extrawelt’s tune into territory that is somehow both more melodic and tribal (as he is wont to do), resulting in a piece of techno that is spellbindingly immersive. The complete Darkroom Dubs Vol. 3 mix will see a release on February 25.
Los Angeles producer Henry Laufer (a.k.a. Shlohmo, pictured above) has shared the How To Dress Well-featuring opener for his forthcoming Laid Out EP before it’s released early next month. Truthfully, we saw the collaboration coming for some time, as both artists have openly admired one another’s work seemingly from the start. How To Dress Well’s injured croon adds a thick layer of sensuality to Shlohmo’s full-bodied production on the slow-grooving “Don’t Say No.” Laufer seems to be returning to a more guitar-touched production style, which adds a welcomed natural vibe to the tune. And in case you missed it, Shlohmo will take off next week with fellow Wedidit producer D33J for a North American tour, and How To Dress Well is currently in the middle of a worldwide tour of his own. You can stream “Don’t Say No” before it’s released on March 4, below.
The German purveyor of infectious, ’80s-touched house anthems, Tensnake delivered his contribution to the BBC’s Essential mix series over the weekend, issuing a nearly two-hour display of top-notch beats, bass, and vibes. The DJ/producer’s set includes gems from artists like Move D, Soul Clap, Todd Terje, Gerd, Tom Demac, DJ Harvey, Detroit Swindle, brand-new tracks from the mixmaster himself, and many others. This mix also comes with word that its creator has plans to release a new single in May, but before then, you can stream and download Tensnake’s Essential mix in all of its house-centric glory, below.
Drew Daniel and Martin Schmidt, who together form the group Matmos, have spent most of their production career seeking out unconvential concepts and sound sources to use within their adventerous electronic works, resulting in a discography that is rarely stale and consistently unique. For their latest record, The Marriage of True Minds, Daniel and Schmidt enlisted volunteers to participate in the Ganzfeld experiment, in which Daniel would attempt to telepathicly transmit the sound of Matmos’ then-unmade record to the participants, whose descriptions of what they heard in their head would in turn serve as the blueprint for the album’s tracks. In the process, subjects reported back everything from sloshing buckets of water to the sound of triangles and synthetic strings, leading Matmos to incorporate a wide range of unexpected elements while making their record. In order to gain some insight into exactly how it all worked, we visited Daniel and Schmidt in their basement studio in Baltimore—the duo’s adopted hometown since relocating from San Francisco six years ago—and picked the veteran sonic adventurers’ brains about their unconventional process and quirky set of tools.
XLR8R: Is this basement studio the biggest studio space you guys have ever had? Drew Daniel: Totally. We have a baby grand piano and can set up a full drum kit, guitars, a bass, amps, and still have enough space for tons of keyboards. The amount of real estate is fucking awesome and it does change the way you work; you’re just more likely to try out a weird signal chain.
How do you guys connect all your pieces together? Does every unit correspond to a channel on the board or are you always changing how the signals are chained together? DD: The patchbay gets a lot of work because we’re tracking and mixing through that mixer; we don’t like to mix on-screen. Our set-up definitely has to be flexible for lots of different projects, lots of different sizes of ensembles.
So you’ll use the computer as a platform to record and then run the audio back out through the mixer when you do mixdowns? DD: Yeah, exactly.
And then you record the stereo mix back in the computer? Martin Schmidt: Honestly, until very recently, we would record it onto DAT [tape]. But I don’t even know where to buy DAT tape in bulk in Baltimore.
DD: DAT is so exotic now, it’s like saying you archive to wax cylinders or something.
How recently did you make the switch? MS: In the last year.
DD: It was just that we know the old ways and it’s what we’re comfortable with. I don’t like to mix on-screen; I like to use my hands and fingers and to touch an EQ or a fader, and Martin is the same way. And I think there’s something nice about the material feeling of committing to tape—you’re actually taking up material space in the world.
MS: It has a practical aspect as well. It ties in with a fear I have for everyone—especially younger people—in the musical world, which is that I have records that I bought in high school in 1981, and I just sincerely doubt that in 36 years, these kids are going to have the files they downloaded in high school. The practicality of DAT is that I like to have the stuff on the shelf. Those DAT tapes are not going to crash.
DD: There’s a weird sweetness to opening up a cigar box and there’s a DAT with our handwriting from 1995, and there they are, our first songs. To be able to go back like that is fun. On the other hand, of course I like the speed and transparency of a digital mix that is then uploaded and that can then be checked out by someone in Paris who wants to hear it; and it all happens without licking a stamp. We definitely see the appeal of the modern world, to a point. [laughs]
Do you guys have set roles or a specific way you split up the work when producing together? MS: Drew is a much more obsessive fiddler—he’ll do something, go back, change it, go back change it, and so on. I learned how to do stuff on tape and I’ve retained those habits. I still think about tracks as if they were on tape in a way.
DD: Martin is more likely to sit and tinker with a synthesizer sound until he’s got something that he is really happy with and then record it. I’m more likely to sit in Ableton and chop up samples and build rhythmic kits or try out a plug-in. We just work in slightly different ways, which is good because we don’t step on each other’s toes as much. There are parts of the process that are more me or more him. Martin mixes our records. I don’t. I had a sinus infection, which caused me to lose a lot of hearing in my left ear above 12 kHz. I don’t trust my hearing as much as I trust Martin’s, so he mixes us because he’s more of a stickler and he’s much more precise. I’m more likely to laboriously make 20 different hi-hat patterns and then have Martin decide which one we should use.
You guys have some really unique pieces, such as this wooden synth that looks kind of like a xylophone. What is that? DD: It’s called a Sidrassi Organ. It uses piezo [microphones] that convert pressure into pitch and CV information and then it has some really complex LFOs that seem to drive the left-right panning. It’s one of the most actively stereo-electronic instruments I’ve ever played. It’s a wildly unique piece of gear. It seems to have buttons that short-circuit and randomize lots of its values, so you really never get the same effect with that thing.
MS: It’s an instrument designed by Peter Blasser.
You also have a Polygamist synth, which I’ve never seen before. What’s the story behind that? MS: It’s the only one in the world at this point.
Really? MS: Yes, I work in a record store in Baltimore, The True Vine. One day this kid came in—giant, liberty-spikes mohawk, looks like a punker from 1983—and he saw that we had an extra room and asked if he could set up a shop where he would fix amps, and synthesizers, and stuff. So we said, “Hell yes,” and after a few months of doing that, it became clear that he was capable of doing a lot more than fixing stuff. I asked him if he could build something from scratch and that was the beginning of building the Mosturizer synth, of which we’ve sold 500 now. He now makes his living off of building these things and the Polygamist is the next big project that we’ve come up with together. I’m no solderer, but I am an evil capitalist, or something, so I put in the money. [laughs] And he’ll listen to me when it comes to interface design and graphic design at times, although he has some really strong opinions.
Most of your records are guided by conceptual themes in some way. For this one, you had people participate in the Ganzfeld Experiment, and then used what the participants had described as the guide for creating the album’s songs. What exactly is happening in the period between gathering this material and then actually producing the music? DD: Every record is different. For this [one], we did a lot of telepathic experiments at home in Baltimore and abroad in Oxford and Pennsylvania. We spent a couple of years in research mode, making kind of spooky, occult pieces out of the sessions, but not making songs in the way that we knew that we were going to.
In that period are you not making music then? MS: Oh, God no. It’s not as serious as that sounds.
DD: Martin is always playing and improvising with lots of other people and I have my side projects and other things I work on. But it is true that when it’s time to go, “Okay, is this a song for the telepathy record?” and the answer is “No,” or “Not strongly enough,” then we have to keep working. The concepts do impose a certain expectation.
MS: Honestly, it’s freeing, that’s the truth. You don’t start by sitting down and saying to yourself, “What am I going to do?” and then start a beat and then fiddle something on top of it and then fiddle something on top of that—you can end up making a lot of stupid techno that way. So this gives us a new shape of skeleton every time and leads us to places we wouldn’t necessarily ever go to if we didn’t have these [guidelines].
There are a lot of sounds on this LP—and most of your albums—that are not traditionally musical. How do you go about recording and capturing those? DD: Usually we’ll start by trying to do it ourselves in our studio. Martin is generally the engineer and player of objects, and I have a portable Zoom recording device and whenever there is something that might be noteworthy—whether it’s crows freaking out in the trees next to our house or humans freaking out, like after the Ravens won the Superbowl—I’ll whip that out and try to gather things from the real world. We try to avoid preset sounds of FX from a collection unless there is some conceptual reason to go there.
How do you approach mixing those sounds into the tracks? Do you sort of treat them as if they were musical instruments? MS: It’s different with every song, but I definitely am guilty of reducing everything in my mind to a kick drum, a hi-hat, a horn line, a bass—I think I do it fairly transparently now, kind of without really thinking about it. It almost seems a bit boring to work with those actual things now. Yes, there is an endless micro-variety between different kick drums, but once you’ve sourced kick drums from everything in the world, actually banging a beater on a drum seems a little dull.
DD: It’s the same with how we edit and arrange audio, too. The way that I might crop or edit a sample, I may have in mind the vocabulary of a snare or a hi-hat. There are ways to edit the noise of somebody pulling their clothes out of a gym locker where you can turn it into a sound that’s closer to a woodwind instrument or something. We try to treat these noises as if they were already musical instruments.
It probably went mostly unnoticed when Russian producer 813 (a.k.a. Alexander Goryachev) posted “The Whaler” on SoundCloud in early 2011. Though the track garnered sufficient applause from like-minded fans, it took two years for the song to manifest as part of a physical release. Despite the delay, “The Whaler” can now be found—along with six other tracks—on the Recolor EP, the first offering of the year from Slugabed’s Activia Benz imprint. The record explores familiar terrain, using footwork- and chiptune-inspired beats on par with Russia’s most notable beatmakers. Its sound palette may not be original, but Goryachev does a solid job of distinguishing himself from his peers. Most of the Recolor EP finds him slowing things down to a mellow groove, allowing the listener to appreciate the fine production values which might be lost in, say, the furious meanderings often favored by fellow Russians Pixelord or DZA.
The triumphant “Fantasmo feat. Bobby Tank” and the ’80s-reminiscent “Crystal RAW”—two more selections from 813’s past—also appear on the record. Both tracks originally popped up on SoundCloud in the months following the debut of “The Whaler,” and at that time, their hyperactive, metal-tinged aesthetic offered a fresh sound. In particular, “Crystal RAW”—where a finger-tapping solo indecisively flutters into skyrocketing keys—showcases this musical formula at its best. That said, hearing these tracks nearly two years later, they come across as far less innovative, simply because the aesthetic has become so ubiquitous. Make no mistake—these are not bad songs, or even unoriginal ones, but the impact of Recolor is undoubtedly lessened by this delay. It doesn’t help matters that even some of the EP’s newer tracks, like “Frosty Morning” and “Elastique,” operate safely within the confines of dreamy electronic pop, failing to push any boundaries or evoke much excitement.
Still, Recolor does have its pleasant attributes. “256 Colors,” the EP’s most club-friendly number, introduces a new aspect of 813’s sound. Featuring a beat that lands somewhere in the ether between hip-hop, footwork, and house, the track also rolls out a lambasting bassline that’s sure to rile up the dancefloor. The hypnotic, pitch-shifted lyrics—which repeat the line “Let yourself go”—only add to the song’s rhythm and excitement, characteristics unmatched by the EP’s other tracks. Another highlight is “Charger,” whose thuggish, crow-hawking beats could be interpreted as a musical parallel to Goraychev’s day job as a firefighter; one can imagine him dodging flames and saving lives as the track unfolds.
Without question, the Recolor EP would have been better served by a release last year or even the year before, yet the record still holds up. For instance, “The Whaler,” now an ancient track by today’s standards, is still capable of effortlessly capturing the imagination and running with it. At the same time, hopes were high for Recolor, and in the end, it’s less of a transcendent statement and more like a simple sigh of relief, both for 813 and those who have been holding out for the proper release of these tracks.
Over the past few years, Welsh producer Benjamin Damage (a.k.a. Benjamin O’Shea) has been involved in a lot of quality music, yet it seems like he hasn’t quite received his proper due, most likely because he’s best known for producing in tandem with others. Back in 2010, he teamed up with Venom on “Deeper,” the inaugural release from Doc Daneeka‘s Ten Thousand Yen label. And although that particular partnership didn’t continue, Damage did find a kindred spirit in Daneeka, with whom he produced the stellar “Creeper” b/w “Infamous” single in 2011. At the behest of Modeselektor, the pair then relocated to Berlin and turned out a full-length debut, They!Live, which thrust the two producers properly into the spotlight. (Shortly thereafter, the duo also put together an excellent XLR8R podcast.) Now, more than a year after the release of They!Live, Benjamin Damage is fully stepping out on his own, following last year’s “Swarm” b/w “Headache” single with a solo full-length, Heliosphere. The album drops later this week, so we figured it would also be a good time for Damage to go it alone on the DJ front and put together a mix for our podcast series. As those who’ve followed Damage’s evolution might expect, the podcast is rooted in techno, namely the dark, hard-charging, low-end-heavy variety favored by like-minded producers such as Untold and Trevino. The music is propulsive, and while the rhythms twist and turn over the course of an hour, the momentum is never lost. Damage has only lived in Berlin for a couple of years, but it’s clear that he’s been taking notes from the city’s club confines. His podcast offers an intense listen, but it’s also a highly enjoyable one.
01 Benjamin Damage “Light Year” (50Weapons) 02 Obsolete Music Technology “Drum Relapse” (Machining Dreams) 03 Autechre “Bladelores” (Warp) 04 Will & Ink “First Fermat” (Will & Ink) 05 R&B “Bottleneck” 06 Planetary Assault Systems “Kray Squid” (Ostgut Ton) 07 Benjamin Damage “010x” (50Weapons) 08 Monomood “Share Some Light” 09 Hypno “Dynamic Maze of the Self” 10 Bodhi “Culture (Bambounou Remix)” (Grizzly) 11 Barker & Baumecker “Crows (Blawan Remix)” (Ostgut Ton) 12 R&B “Love Rhythm” 13 Truncate “Truncate.7” (Truncate) 14 Paul Mac “Resident Problem (Kamikaze Space Programme Remix)” (Tactical) 15 Benjamin Damage “Delirium Tremens” (50Weapons) 16 Reeko “Electrical Phenomena” (Pole Group) 17 Trevino “Ojak” 18 Benjamin Damage “Swarm” (50Weapons)
