For over a decade, Wylie Cable and his Dome of Doom label have been something of a beating heart in Los Angeles’ experimental beats community. Last month, he returned with Warmed By The Sun, his ninth album bursting with heavy rhythms and soothing breakdowns. To create it, he leaned on the likes of virtuosic drummer Gene Coye, England’s CLYDE, and Mexico City’s resident lyrical assassin, Speak.

A Los Angeles native, Cable grew up on the streets of Los Feliz and, after learning instruments through school, he applied his skills to various bands including The Dog of Tears Orchestra and Grapes & Nuts, a jazz band that played for five years around the west coast. Thirsty for more, in 2011 he began channeling his wilder musical energies towards Dome of Doom, a beats label known for pressing a limited run of cassettes with each release, almost all of which sell out. Each project features an array of innovative instrumentals, and emphasizes a head-nodding low end.

What grew out of a dissatisfaction with how record labels were run has grown into a platform that has afforded Cable the freedom to mold his musical influences, ideas, and emotions into impactful art without the distraction of commercialism. This has shaped Cable into a singular artist whose sounds know no limits. Over time, he’s extended this ethos to influential talents like Huxley Anne, Daedelus, Bleep Bloop, and Kenny Segal, and also to a new generation of artists like Saka, who recently contributed to XLR8R’s podcast series. Earlier this year, Cable brought some of these artists to XLR8R+, delivering a package of unreleased music alongside Cable, CLYDE, Gnome Beats, and QRTR.

Unsurprisingly, many of these artists also feature in Cable’s podcast, an extended version of the mix he played for the album release. In fact, he chose tracks for people whom he knew would be in the crowd that evening. Expect just over an hour of IDM, lo-fi house, trap, drum & bass, and jungle.

01. What have you been up to recently?
I just released my ninth full-length album, Warmed By The Sun. It’s a 21-track mix-tape of tunes I’ve made over the past two years that I’m actually quite happy with. I also recently played a release party for the record with Daedelus and Anna Morgan at The Love Song in Los Angeles for Scenario, a new weekly event hosted by Alpha Pup and Spaceland. Outside of that, I have been working on all the releases for the label this year. Working chronologically so far this year, we’ve released music for Fellsius, BOSTN, Dabow, DMVU, Finnoh, QRTR, Daedelus, PENNYWILD, myself, and Bleep Bloop.

02. What have you been listening to?
In my work life, I’ve been focused on listening to new music and demos that people have sent me for next year. The other week I spent several days just listening to hundreds of songs and making lists and crossing things off the lists and making new lists. I definitely spend a ton of time listening to new music and curate a really small selection of it to actually release on the label.

In my personal life I’ve been listening to a ton of records, I’m actually in my studio right now so I’m just going to go through the stack of my recently played vinyl and rattle off some of my favorites: Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?; Freddie Hubbard Polar AC; Thelonious Monk Septet Monks Music; King Krule Man Alive!, Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders, and The London Symphony Orchestra Promises; Pharoah Sanders Live At The East; SOPHIE Lemonade / Hard; Ralph Heidel Relief; Burial, Four Tet, and Thom Yorke Her Revolution / His Rope; F.J. McMahon Spirit of the Golden Juice; The 5th Dimensions Greatest Hits; QRTR infina ad nausea; Wes Montgomery A Day In the Life; Zapp Zapp; Khruangbin; The Universe Smiles Upon You, Khruangbin Con Todo El Mundo, Four Tet There Is Love In You; Four Tet There Is Love In You (Remixes); Pixies Surfer Rosa.

03. Where and when did you record this mix?
I recorded this mix myself at Dome of Doom HQ using a Pioneer Nexus 900 Mixer, CDJ2000s, and a Zoom H4n Pro. I did the recording live in one take so there are no edits. It’s just the full hour with a little bit of compression and limiting in Ableton so it sounds nice to listen to in your car or wherever.

04. What can the listener expect?
Expectations will often let you down, but if I was trying to describe this to someone who’s never heard me play a set before to entice them into listening I would call it this: a chaotic but powerful and emotional journey through tempo and style, woven together with both sonic-and story-based references.

05. How did you go about choosing the tracks you’ve included?
I’ve been DJing for quite some time now and I think at this point in my creative journey I like to approach it with a broad stroke and open palette. Music is one of my favorite things in the world. To get the opportunity to tell stories and communicate my emotions and experiences through sound feels like a huge blessing in the fact that I feel I have found a medium that can touch on the vast range of human emotions that we experience living life.

I’ve made countless mixes and played more shows than I can remember at this point, so the tracks I choose are usually an amalgamation of deep cuts from five-to-10 years ago mixed with new unreleased music and selections of my favorite releases from the current year. Of all my widely varied artistic pursuits, I feel that curation has been one that I find myself to be the most skilled at, and when I have applied myself to it wholeheartedly it has yielded the most fruitful results. Ultimately I’m just following my own creative instincts and artistic intuition, and I treat making mixes like making unique works of art like a collage, where the amalgamation of the original components and references can create a wholly new piece for the listener to enjoy.

06. How does it compare to what we’d normally hear you play out?
Well, in this specific instance the tracklisting is literally the same one I curated for my release show last month, so it’s quite on brand with something you might hear from me at a live show. I’m also excited to add that I only had a 45 minute set at the show, so the recorded mix I made for this is like the extended clip edition that has all the songs I had originally imagined would go in a full-hour set from beginning to end.

Like so many other mix artists, I use the allegory of telling a story through sound, and have always felt that I can communicate complex ideas and feelings through music that I simply can’t with words alone. The mix itself is emotional and meaningful to me personally and a lot of the song selections were made for specific people that I knew would be at the show. I’m glad there is a recorded version of this particular playlist because it is special to me, both because I feel it’s a strong example of my anarchic mixing style and unique selections and because now I can listen to this myself and think about all the people and experiences that inspired me to make the mix in the first place!

07. What ‘s up next for you?
Currently I’m focused on programming the 2023 release calendar for the label as well as completing the recording process for my own release for next year. Recently I’ve been recording some songs with my long time friend and creative colleague Luis Flores in Los Angeles. Luis and I used to play together in our old hybrid jazz/death metal band Grapes & Nuts. He’s a super talented guitar player but he has also become a highly decorated studio engineer as well.

The material Luis and I are recording together is all live recordings of me playing guitar and singing. It is all original material I’ve written over the past eight years and, for the select few friends that have been supporting my artistic journey from the beginning, some of these songs might actually feel familiar and sound like a sort of return to form to my first entries into songwriting and being a musician and live performer in bands when I was just barely a teenager.

I realize that the vast majority of the music I’ve released under my name would categorize me as a primarily electronic artist and producer rather than a multi-instrumentalist and songwriter, but in fact that is where my own personal creative journey really started. So I’m excited and terrified to finally officially share some of the extremely vulnerable songs that I’ve held close to my chest for a long time.

XLR8R has now joined Mixcloud Select, meaning that to hear the podcast offline you will need to subscribe to our Select channel to listen offline, or subscribe to XLR8R+ to download the file. The move to Mixcloud Select will ensure that all the producers with music featured in our mixes get paid. You can read more about it here.

Full XLR8R+ Members can download the podcast below. If you’re not an XLR8R+ member, you can read more about it and subscribe here.

Tracklisting

01. Darwin Deez “The World’s Best Kisser” (Lucky Number Music Limited)
02. Alix Perez “Under Pressure” feat. T-Man (1985 Music)
03. Ivy Lab “Indian Flute (2020 Bootleg) (Unreleased)
04. J Dilla “Fuck The Police” (Mass Appeal)
05. J Dilla “E=MC²” feat. Common (BBE Music)
06. Armani White “Billie Eilish” (Def Jam Recordings)
07. XXYYXX “About You” (Relief In Abstract Records)
08. Gucci Mane “Bucket List” (Guwop Enterprises/Atlantic)
09. Tsuruda “Delivery” (Alpha Pup Records)
10. Maru “Unchain” (Dome of Doom Records)
11. thook “phantom ops” (Self-Released)
12. Dabow “Frambuesa” (Dome of Doom Records)
13. Dabow “Frambuesa” (Jon Casey Remix) (Dome of Doom Records)
14. Dynoro & Gigi D’Agostin “In My Mind” (B1 Recordings)
15. Jon Casey “CHROMIUM” (Dome of Doom Records)
16. The XX “You Got The Love” (Florence And The Machine cover) (Unreleased)
17. Kid Cudi “Day ‘N’ Nite” (Yojas remix) (Unreleased)
18. Yojas “Terre Pon” (Unreleased)
19. Blake Skowron “Freddy Spaghetti” (Self-Released)
20. Gucci Mane “Finesse the Plug Interlude (Guwop Enterprises/Atlantic)
21. Tsuruda “babababababab” (Live Edit) (Alpha Pup Records)
22. thook “Taken” (Dome of Doom Records)
23. EASTGHOST “I_CANT_SHOW_U_THE_WORLD_BUT_I_CAN_SHOW_YOU_THIS” (Unreleased)
24. Lil Pump “FIJI” (Warner Records)
25. Little Snake x Holly “Reflector” (Deadbeats)
26. Fred Again “Jungle” (Rico Nasty Remix)(Atlantic Records)
27. JD Reid “Launch” (Rinse)
28. JD Reid “Rōshi” (feat. D Double E)(Rinse)
29. The Bug “Jah War” feat. Flowdan (Loefah Remix) (Ninja Tune)
30. Chef Boyarbeatz “Steady Slurkin'” (Deep Dark & Dangerous)
31. Peter Kuli “OK Boomer” (prod. Jedwill)(Elektra Records)
32. XXXTENTACION “#ImSippinTeaInYoHood” (Prod. RONNYJLISTENUP) (Columbia Records)
33. EVA808 “PRRR” (DUBPLATE) (Innamind Recordings)
34. Jon Casey “Nosedive” (Dome of Doom Records)
35. Deft “HUMBLE” (20/20 LDN)
36. TRAKA “Straight Wheel Up” (feat. Killa P) (YUKU)
37. Dabow “Ya Booty” (Dome of Doom Records)
38. Meek Mill “Levels” (Baht Remix) (Unreleased)
39. Graves “Dong Song” (fast as fuck edit) (Unreleased)
40. Fellsius “The Drum” (Dome of Doom Records)
41. Kendrick Lamar “DNA” (Yung Bae Remix) (Unreleased)
42. Dabow & Good Times Ahead “Rapido” (Dome of Doom Records)
43. thook “SPEED” (Dome of Doom Records)
44. Getter “Inhalant Abuse” (Shred Collective)
45. Wylie Cable “Big Brane Debroka Flip” (Dome of Doom Records)
46. BOSTN “ID” (Unreleased)