New Orleans’ own originator of “swamp tech” and inventor of the Drum Buddy, Quintron, has never been one shy of trying new ideas. Case in point, his forthcoming LP for Memphis’ Goner imprint was entirely made over a three-month residency inside the New Orleans Museum of Modern Art. Over this period, Quintron showed up everyday to create tunes for the LP as part of an open art exhibit (photo above) where he spent most of his time generally ignoring any viewers of the exhibit (unless he needed some extra claps or backing vocals) in order to create thousands of hours of material. The LP, of which the best material was selected from this output, is entitled Sucre Du Sauvage (or “Sugar of the Savages”) and is comprised of two parts, the first being more traditional Quintron tunes along the lines of his signature “swamp tech” style, and the second being more abstract compositions dominated by the field recordings that were gathered from around the museum during his time there. Sucre Du Sauvage is set to be released April 12 and Quintron, along with frequent collaborator Miss Pussycat, will be taking his extremely energetic show around the US with a string of dates planned for the coming months (including Mardi Gras parades in his hometown of NOLA), which you can check out below following the album art and tracklist.

Tracklist:
1. Ring The Alarm
2. Face Down in the Gutter
3. New Years Night (Boogie Children)
4. Kicked Out of Zolar X
5. Banana Beat
6. Sucre Du Sauvage
7. All Night Right of Way
8. Spirit Hair
9. Elevator
10. Deer in the Clouds
11. Bells
12. Train Ride
13. Jazz Bar
14. Morning

Tour Dates:
Mon, Feb 21 – Mobile, AL @ Alabama Music Box
Tues, Feb 22 – Tallahassee @ Engine Room
Wed, Feb 23 – Orlando, FL @ Backbooth
Thurs, Feb 24 – Miami, FL @ GRAND CENTRAL
Fri, Feb 25 – Bruise Cruise (from Miami to Nassau Bahamas and back, hopefully)
Fri, Feb 25 – Special Bruise Cruise Nassau show @ Senor Frogs
Sat, Mar 5 – New Orleans, LA – Mardis Gras @ SPELLCASTER MARITIME BALL
Mon, Mar 7 – New Orleans, LA – Mardis Gras @ One Eyed Jacks – annual Lundi Gras show

9th Ward Marching Band (100 piece band directed by Quintron and Miss Pussycat) Parade Schedule:
Fri, Mar 4 – Krewe De E’tat – 6pm roll time, uptown route
Sat, Mar 5 – Spellcaster to Siberia Parade – 2pm (time subject to change) roll time, exact route secret until roll time
Mon, Mar 7 – Krewe of Proteus – 5 or 6pm roll time, uptown route

The once-elusive fellow behind our 19th favorite track of 2010, DJ/producer/singer Ben Westbeech, has shed his Breach moniker in favor of his given name for his next album, There’s More to Life Than This, which will be released sometime in April courtesy of Strictly Rhythm. In preparation for that release, the artist has a few snazzy things to share with us—namely, a fresh look for his website and a brand-new compilmentary tune. If you head to benwestbeech.com, you can check out Westbeech’s new online digs, and at the bottom of that page, you can submit your email address to get your hands on the exclusive “Slowly” track. Plenty of other bits of music and info—such as exclusive DJ mixes delivered every two months—are also available on the website, so you ought to get to clickin’ already.

The Boulder, Colorado electronic music and arts festival, Communikey, has released a small list of performers for the fourth edition of the festival to take place April 13-17. The line-up so far seems to aim at finding a balance between the pioneers and classic artists of electronic music along with fresh talent from electronic music’s newer class. Legendary names like Atom TM (a.k.a. Uwe Schmidt, a.k.a. Señor Coconut), Monolake, Mike Huckaby (pictured above), and William Basinski will share the stage with Mark McGuire (of Emeralds), Dark Dark Dark, and ZZK’s Chancha Via Circuito and El G among others. A pretty impressive line-up, especially considering there are more names to come. To check out the entire list of acts slated to perform so far, and to get more info on the event, head over to the Communikey Festival site.

Back in November we got word of a new drum & bass comp from dBridge’s Exit Records imprint to feature a slew of well-known and on-the-rise producers including Scuba (pictured above), Instra:mental, Skream, Commix, and dBridge himself. Now we’ve gotten our hands on five streaming tracks from Mosaic Vol. 1 representing the wide range of drum & bass that the compilation attempts to cover. As we said before, this is not “your daddy’s drum & bass.” Instead, Mosaic Volume 1 attempts to showcase some of the forgotten corners of the genre, replacing the over-used boom-bap D&B shuffle with an ear for the other rhythms and textures that can be incorporated into the style. You can stream five tracks from the double-disc comp below and check the full tracklist and album artwork here. Mosaic Vol. 1 is set to be released January 31.

mosaic vol1 track to stream by Melissa

Los Angeles MC/producer Blu has been steadily bubbling up from the underground with a string of releases including collaborations with fellow LA-based producers Exile, Ta’Raach, and Mainframe. Blu’s been bubbling so much, in fact, that he’s currently working hard on his major label debut (that’s right, Warner Brothers), so in the meantime the freshly founded New World Color imprint is set to release an EP based on Blu’s standout track from his 2009 Her Favorite Colo(u)r mixtape, “Amnesia.” The Amnesia EP will contain three previously released Blu tracks and a new track entitled “Amnesia(Rewind)” along with instrumentals for all but one of the tunes. Considering most of Blu’s material lives somewhere on the vast internet in mixtape and MP3 form, this EP should prove to be of the more comprehensive releases of the artist’s material to date. You can stream the title track from the EP, as well as check out the full tracklist, below. The Amnesia EP will be released February 15 in digital form and March 1 in 10″ vinyl format.

Tracklist:
Side A
1. Amnesia(Original)
2. Amnesia(Instrumental)
3. Amnesia(Remind)
4. Amnesia(RewindInstrumental)
Side B
1. Since(Original)
2. Since(Instrumental)
3. GoodMorning