Of all the monikers belonging to techno veteran Luke Slater, Planetary Assault Systems boasts the longest shelf life, and arguably the most success. The music he produces as PAS fits the name well—it’s otherworldly and atonal, as if the scattered pitches were attacking all preconceived musical sensibilities. In “Human Like Us,” a track from The Messenger (released last week via Ostgut Ton), Slater stacks noises that would be at home as Twilight Zone background music on top of heaps of percussion for a dark, anxiety-inducing space-techno journey.
One of the many collaborative tracks featured on veteran tunesmith Zed Bias‘ new LP for Tru Thoughts, Biasonic Hotsauce – Birth of the Nanocloud (out today), is a surprising cut that finds the artist working alongside Toddla T and Mark de Clive-Lowe. We use the word surprising because instead of the soulful garage or skittering 2-step productions we’re used to hearing from Bias (or his Maddslinky moniker), “Koolade” is a squelching, ’80s-funk-indebted jam that we’d expect from a few DFA affiliates or a more disco-centric Dâm-Funk.
Despite having just inaugurated his own Fade to Mind imprint, LA-based DJ/producer Kingdom remains part of the Night Slugs crew and has announced that he will release his next record via Bok Bok’s and L-Vis 1990’s UK bass hub. The four-track Dreama EP is scheduled to drop on November 21, but before then, you can check out the artwork (pictured above) and the tracklist (below). There’s also a lengthy preview of Kingdom’s forthcoming 12″ streaming in the player at the top of Night Slugs’ home page.
1. Let You No 2. Stalker Ha 3. Dreama 4. Hood By Air Theme
How long can one suspend disbelief? That’s the principle question raised by “A Saturday in November (feat. Kim Ann Foxman),” KiNK‘s & Neville Watson’s latest release on Rush Hour sub-label Hour House Is Your Rush. The two-track release explores a retro-hued territory that doesn’t just wax nostalgic, but instead strives to disappear from the present and place itself squarely in the past. Granted, it’s an aesthetic that has consistently worked for the duo on club-rocking instrumental tracks like the acidified “Inside Out” and techno-hued “Blueprint.” But, in the case of “A Saturday in November,” the formula just doesn’t work.
The single is broken up into two sides: a vocal cut and a dub. The overall vibe of the record is evocative of a loose stew of late-’80s New York underground dance conventions—freestyle, latin house, Chicago house, and garage are all well represented. This is particularly evident on the dub side, which features a drum pattern lifted straight from Orange Yellow’s “Dreams of Santa Anna,” a churning Mr. Fingers bassline, and sound effects that could be described as “Fairlight-esque.” Yet, though the release scores great marks for its instrumental sequencing, ultimately it’s let down by Kim Ann Foxman’s vocals, which unfortunately manage to sound both too retro and not retro enough. She accomplishes this by flatly singing a chorus with such tired exhortations as “time to move it,” “let the rhythm groove,” and (the particularly cringe-worthy) “house that body right.” It’s a shame, because a large part of what made the music of that period good was the intense vocal pyrotechnics and dynamic range of divas and other church-choir-trained singers (sampled or otherwise). It wouldn’t be such a problem, but the vocals just take up so much space on both sides. We can’t help but wonder why they released this one without the complete instrumental take as well.
Last month, Berlin duo Modeselektor released Monkeytown, its third LP and just one of many things the pair discussed in its lengthy recent conversation with fellow electronic-music veteran Martyn. Now, the guys have unveiled the album’s first video. “Shipwreck” is also the first single from Monkeytown, and features the vocal contributions of Radiohead frontman and long-time collaborator Thom Yorke. Directed by Tony “Truand” Datis, the clip depicts a little boy and his attempt to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. It’s kind of like a well-soundtracked version of The Road or The Walking Dead, although we can’t tell if the other people in the video are supposed to be cannibals or zombies or just plain-old humans. There’s also a big dog in the mix. The “Shipwreck” single will be released on November 4; the artwork and tracklist is below.
It was recently announced that Austin producer Dubbel Dutch had officially joined the ranks of Dre Skull‘s Mixpak label, and now, the Brooklyn-based imprint has let slip the details—and some sound clips—of his first Mixpak release. Entitled Hymn, the four-track EP (artwork above) finds Dubbel Dutch turning out more of the stripped-down and drum-heavy club tunes that have become his signature. The EP will be released on November 15, but check the complete tracklist and listen to a previews of each song below.
1. Open Up 2. Darq 3. Heartbreak 4. Hymn
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Of all the leftield Southern California beatmakers, Teebs is unquestionably one of the best, and now he’s ready to follow up his stellar debut full-length, Ardour, with a new set of songs he’s calling Collections 01 (artwork above). It’s not an album in the strictest sense of the word, but instead the first chapter in a series Teebs describes as, “Just mini collections of ideas… I hope to release them randomly through my life as if they were paintings in a drawn-out series.” The song “Cook, Clean, Pay the Rent (New House Version)” surfaced yesterday on Pitchfork, and now the Brainfeeder camp has sent along “Pretty Poly,” a hazily gorgeous slice of loping beat work. Collections 01 will be released on November 8. The complete 10-song tracklist can be found after the jump.
1. Just The Yellow Bits 2. Cook, Clean, Pay The Rent (New House Version) 3. Pretty Poly 4. Jahara 5. Verbena Tea with Rebekah Raff 6. Your Favorite Weekday 7. LSP feat. Austin Peralta 8. While You Dooooo (Extended) 9. Red Curbs Loop (Stuff I Dream About) 10. Yellow More New
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Word of enticing lectures and events continues to trickle in from this year’s Red Bull Music Academy in Madrid, but we haven’t forgotten the litany of cool stuff that made up the RBMA World Tour in the months prior to the Academy’s official launch in the Spanish capital. We’ve been premiering each part of the video series summarizing that global trek right here on XLR8R, and the latest chapter comes from Rome, where the RBMA braintrust celebrated Italy’s storied history with film soundtracks. The clip chronicles the efforts of composer Massimo Nunzi, who leads a variety of musicians in a 52-piece orchestra to perform new takes on classic soundtrack pieces originally written by the likes of Ennio Morricone, Piero Umiliani, Goblin, and others.
Damu (a.k.a. Sam Schorb) sure hasn’t wasted any time while working his way into the UK bass conversation. In less than a year, the Manchester-based producer—and one-time subject of our Bubblin’ series—has released an impressive series of EPs, including offerings on the Local Action, Silverback, and Keysound labels. The latter is also home to his recently released debut full-length, Unity, which finds Damu continuing to meld tweaked, videogame-referencing synth melodies with skittering percussion and pitched R&B vocal bits. The elements of his music may not be particularly unusual, but the way in which he combines them certainly is, which is why Damu productions stand out so clearly from the rest of the UK post-everything pack. Plenty of examples can be found on this exclusive mix for the XLR8R podcast, a unique DJ session which finds Damu gradually increasing the tempo from 110 bpm to 160 bpm over the course of an hour. Along the way, he tosses in samplings of house, techno, dubstep, juke, R&B, and countless other sounds that fall somewhere in between established genre lines.
01 Animal Collective “#1” (Domino) 02 Damu “Go Solar” 03 Thefft “Evening Ago” 04 Redshape “Futureshock” (Delsin) 05 Flying Lotus “Do The Astral Plane” (Warp) 06 Damu “A Day Without You” 07 Benoit & Sergio “Walk And Talk” (Visionquest) 08 Tyree “Nuthin Wrong” (Dance Mania) 09 Damu “Balistik” 10 Tsunga “Coewd” 11 Surgeon “Radiance” (Dynamic Tension) 12 Rustie “Globes” (Warp) 13 Damu “Ether” (Keysound) 14 Richelle “Bendin'” (Pelican Fly) 15 Damu “Shimmer” 16 Bambounou “Alpha” (Youngunz) 17 Damu “Plasm” (Keysound) 18 Dark Sky “Be Myself” (Monkeytown) 19 Damu “Flibberdiflobberdifloo” 20 Water Borders “What Wi Want (Damu Remix)” (Tri Angle) 21 Throwing Snow “Too Polite” (Local Action) 22 Damu “Skinnydipper (Futurwurx Edit)” (Silverback) 23 Circle Traps “Fjord (Damu Remix)” (Opit) 24 DJ Manny “All I Do Is Smoke Trees” (Ghettoteknitionz) 25 DJ Spinn “I’m High” (Juke Trax) 26 Kuedo “Onset (Escapism)” (Planet Mu) 27 Wheez-ie “Keep Yer Chin Up” (Embassy) 28 Damu “Mermaid (Subeena Remix)” (Local Action) 29 Patrick Wolf “The Stars” (Loog)
London duo Royalty is getting set to release a new EP, the five-track Purple Nights. The EP, which includes a remix from Jimmy Edgar, drops November 21 on vinyl, with a digital release a week later, but the pair has let slip “Heart Strings” in the meantime. Although the boy-girl duo hails from London and rubs elbows with the local house/garage/post-everything crowd, its music takes more cues from ’80s electro-funk than the so-called hardcore continuum. With its slappy basslines, vintage synths, and generally funky vibe, “Heart Strings” is a perfect example of what Royalty has on offer. Check the Purple Nights EP artwork and tracklist, along with an audio preview, after the jump.
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