After a stint in hip-hop, DJ Crystl returns with 2004 remixes of his essential anthems. The new version of “Let It Roll” from 1994 is even more heavy and spine-tingling than the original; its pulsing intro employs every dark Metalheadz drum trick before dropping into a pounding, choppy break workout and scary breakdown that will raise the hairs on your neck. 1993’s “Warpdrive” gets turned into an evil monster whose samples take you straight back to the illegal rave days but whose drums are modern to the core. Blazing hot!
Danny C Warheadz EP
Danny C makes mellow rollers and the rough stuff, but on this EP for Metalheadz he puts on the boxing gloves and throws down in the ring. Those who like their drum & bass dark and blistering will love the anthemic hammering of “Long Road” and the complex drums of “Feel,” but the real deal are two mixes of “Warheadz” filled with freaky samples, two-stepping drums and apocalyptic Mentasm stabs.
Distorted Minds Road Rage
Bristol’s Distorted ones team up with Moving Shadow’s EZ Rollers for some serious clown step on “Road Rage,” where an overly-dramatic intro that sounds like TV cop show theme music turns into a sledgehammer of monkey bass and pounding breaks. Flip for the more favorable “Another Fight,” a rave-ready roller that pairs squelchy techno bass and crispy breaks for a retro ’97 jump-up vibe.
Team Doyobi Choose Your Own Adventure
While many bemoan IDM’s creative dearth, Team Doyobi proves that the genre’s in rude health with its third album. The British duo rejects presets, plug-ins and laptops, instead using ill, decrepit emissions from moribund computers to wring some of the most nefarious, head-fucking sounds I’ve ever heard. Choose Your Own Adventure starts out goofing on Rephlex-style electro and spluttering into Sonig-like rhythmic mischief. But after the halfway point, things turn very strange. Tracks become swarms of gangrenous tones and abrasive textures, as TD thrusts you into chaotic videogame cacophonies that sound like Gescom remixing Lucifer’s Black Mass LP. I recommend …Adventure, provided you’re not prone to mental instability.
Chib Moco
Estrogentronica: a new name for women producers putting a distinctively feminine spin on the male-dominated field of IDM. Sexist pigeonholing? Perhaps, but it’s hard to deny that a new wave of challenging female artists-Colleen, Mileece, Tujiko Noriko and now Chib (Tokyo’s Yukiko Chiba)-share sound design that privileges delicate, pointillist melodies and enchanting drift over brash gestures; their tracks explore the grey area between experimental techno, twee pop and Pauline Oliveros pioneering drone excursions. Moco, Chib’s debut album, blends field recordings and obscure blues and chamber orchestra samples with primitive piano, guitar and cello playing, forging music of beautiful pathos and beguiling oddness. While some of Moco comes off as a naive collage, most of its gnomic tone poems sound like the contents of a Neptunean music box.
Strategy Drumsolo’s Delight
A skillful keyboardist for Portland post-rockers Fontanelle and multi-instrumentalist for IDM trio Nudge, Paul Dickow also creates microsound compositions that shimmer and expand with wonder as Strategy. Drumsolo’s Delight, the follow-up to Strategy’s 2003 debut, Strut, begins with two slices of glistening-horizon ambience buttressed by subtle, subaquatic tones similar to Kranky’s Pan American and Loscil. But the next two hypnotic, soulful tracks detour from this comforting placidity into lopsided dub-skank rhythms that would stiffen Pole’s pole. “Walkingtime” (featuring Caro’s heavy-lidded soul vox) conjures a swoony lover’s dub haloed with Seefeel-like shards of guitar. Strategy’s finessed fusion of ambient and dub pacifies, but never bores.
Nu:Logics On + On
The label with the red door comes through again with “On + On” from Cambridge’s Nu:Logics, a nod to Brazilian drum & bass with melodic chords and dark but soulful bassline biz. “Ritz” from JFB starts with a loungy bounce, then adds the drums and rolling basslines…and it’s all over before you can say “more please!”
Miss Kittin I.Com
With her first solo album, I.Com, Miss Kittin steps outside the electro sexbot role she developed on collaborations with The Hacker and Felix Da Housecat. Replacing the icy and titillating Aryan sleaze of “Frank Sinatra” and “Shower Scene” are a series of tracks that, despite primarily techno backings, radiate warmth while displaying multiple personalities. On “Professional Distortion” and “Clone Me,” Kittin gets self-reflective over pealing guitars and electro pulses, respectively, but numbers like “Happy Valentine” and “3eme Sexe” (a cover of the 1985 Indochine hit) show off her softer side, with lush synth melodies and singing that mixes the sweetness of St. Etienne’s Sarah Cracknell with the naivete of French pop vocalist Jane Birkin. Elsewhere you’ll find spoken word tracks of Chicks on Speed dimensions, but Kittin’s still at her best when she’s having fun with the techno form, as on the joyriding “Meet Sue Be She” and the tongue-in-cheek ghetto house track “Requiem For A Hit.”
Horsepower Productions To the Rescue
London trio Horsepower Productions seems to occupy a unique space in the UK garage scene where they can make whatever they want and not get flak for it. This is a good thing, as Horsepower’s second full-length, To The Rescue, is in a genre by itself. I’d like to call it dripcore, as the constant between the ten tracks is oozing, dubbed-out Depth Charge-style bass, which snakes its way through bumpy drums, beating congas and curious African and Middle-Eastern touches. This is real jungle music-of the Heart of Darkness variety-but while tracks like “Golden Nugget” and “Synbad” could shake backsides, To The Rescue isn’t purpose-built for the two-step dancefloor. Rather, place yourself between the bass speakers, smoke ten spliffs, and take your brain to another dimension.
Lion King Sound Sound Klash Ammo V. 3
The problem with mash-ups is that they tend to sound, you know, mashed up. The Sound Klash Ammo series avoids such pitfalls by marrying big tunes from both hip-hop and dancehall and adding flourishes that make them better than the originals. If you’re a club DJ, can you really go wrong with Jay Z over Lil’ Jon, Beyonce over the Coolie Dance riddim and Usher over the Salsa riddim? As a bonus, each volume ends with clash sounds. Anything test, dead.
