Kornél Kovács has shared “Dollar Club,” a new track from his upcoming debut album.
For the past seven years, Kovács has been rocking dancefloors as one third of Stockholm’s Studio Barnhus alongside Axel Boman and Petter Nordkvist. The label and DJ trio is spearheading a new era of Swedish off-center dance music.
The Bells was completed in an intense two-week session with Kovács’ friend and studio engineer Matt Karmil in the winter of 2016. Another close friend, artist Malin Gabriella Nordin, has created the album artwork together with her brother Jonas..
Tracklisting:
A1. Szikra Intro A2. BB A3. Dollar Club B1. Gex B2. Josey’s Tune B3. Dance… While The Record Spins C1. Szív Utca C2. The Bells D1. Pop D2. Urszusz
Ahead of the album’s August 26 release via Studio Barnhus, “Dollar Club” and “BB” are both streamable in full below. The album can be pre-ordered here on LP or CD.
XLR8R’s first ever official podcast was published on August 3, 2006. It came in the form of an exclusive hour-long mix by Plug Research, featuring cuts from Thomas Fehlmann, Flying Lotus, Ammoncontact and many more. In the 10 years that have passed since then—yes, this week marks an entire decade—a whole lot has changed. Firstly, the mix series that started all that time ago is now updated weekly by an artist of our choice; each submission is now shared via our channels every Tuesday of the year—without fail. XLR8R, too, has grown considerably, evolving from a San Francisco-based newsprint ‘zine to a web-only music publication with a more global audience than ever before and offices on both sides of the Atlantic.
Settling on a fitting way to mark this milestone proved to be no easy task. Initial ideas revolved around compiling a list of our favorites from the past decade and sharing these with our readers once again, but we decided against this for two reasons: it didn’t do justice to the occasion, and picking a favorite among such a diverse bunch is either going to lead to a remarkably long list or exclude too many others. After all, there has been no shortage of memorable additions to the series. Gerd Janson’s 2015 submission immediately springs to mind immediately, as do those of Alex Smoke, Nicolas Jaar, Helena Hauff and, more recently Andrew James Gustav—but there really is something in there for everyone. Even mentioning these names leaves out some of the leading pioneers in the global scene, names like Daniel Bell, Laurent Garnier, Gaslamp Killer and Floorplan, all of whom have submissions that can be checked out if and when you please. Picking favorites just wasn’t going to cut it.
After some careful consideration we also concluded that we wanted to serve up some new music for the occasion—and that sparked the following plan. Beginning Monday, August 1, and ending on Saturday, August 6, we are sharing a brand new mix each day for your listening pleasure. And to reflect XLR8R’s growth into a global media outlet, each of these submissions is coming from a different continent; the artists chosen to mark this occasion with us all originate from a different corner of the globe. The task for them was simple: to compile a mix that best represents their musical roots. There has already been one mix—yesterday’s submission on behalf of Australia/Oceania by Australian trio Seekae—and today’s comes from Asia in the shape of a three-hour DJ mix by DJ Nobu.
When it comes to mixing experimentally-inclined electronic music, there aren’t many artists that better represent Asia than Japan’s DJ Nobu. His reputation and demand as a selector has grown from innumerable hours spent in front of a dancefloor, a good majority of them being at Future Terror, the infamous party Nobu runs in his hometown in Chiba, Japan. And although he has been DJing since the ’90s, it’s only been in the last six years or so that he has really started to pick up regular international bookings—a growth much credited to a Marcel Dettmann-helmed Berghain gig in 2010. With roots in punk and hardcore, Nobu’s sound is an unconventional form of house and techno: cerebral, hallucinogenic, abrasive, and woven together with a decidedly punk ethos.
Aside from his chops behind the decks, Nobu runs Bitta, a label that trades in the same currency as the man himself—it also houses most of his fairly modest production output. Other than Bitta, his productions have landed on, among others, Tikita, Grasswaxx Recordings, Japonica, and ZiKoo /Lastrum. Like his DJing, his tracks are carefully considered works of art, timeless slices of left-field electronic music.
As you’ll read below, it’s Nobu’s DJing skills that are front and center in today’s celebratory podcast. Recorded in the Japanese mountains at rural festival, the mix is a perfect three-hour representation of his patient and inimitable style.
When and where was the set recorded? It was recorded on July 16 at an open air festival in the Japanese mountains called rural.
Why did you choose to publish a festival set rather than a studio session? rural is a rather conceptual music festival, and I thought the sound of this set is quite interesting and represents another dimension of the current Japanese techno scene. You can definitely create a more polished mix in studio, but since I’ve managed to play an interesting set at a festival setting, I wanted to share it with people who didn’t attend the festival too.
Why did you choose this festival recording? What was so special about it? I played this set right after Ena and Felix K‘s experimental live set. My role was to navigate the crowd gradually into dancing mood, and I think the outcome fairly distinctively shows my style.
What equipment did you use? CDJ2000Nexus x 3 and an Allen & Heath Xone 92.
Did you have a specific idea/mood that you wanted to express in the set? The festival site was at 2,000m up in the mountains, so I took that environment, surrounding nature and the atmosphere of the location into consideration. It was at the beginning of the night, and supposed to set the mood to dance. I tried to be a little bit more adventurous than usual, and picked the right tracks in right tempo to achieve that.
What have you got coming up this year? I have a few more EU tours lined up. The August tour looks like this: 06-08 Dekmantel Festival, Amsterdam, NL 07-08 Klubnacht, Berghain, Berlin, DE 13-08 Semantica Diez, Sala Razzmatazz, Barcelona, ES 14-08 Fuse-off, Kompass Klub, Ghent, BE
Nina Kraviz‘ Trip label has revealed details of Bjarki‘s latest LP, the second part of a 41-track three-album series that was announced back in May.
Entitled Lefthanded Fuqs, the LP is a collection of “experimental material from the archive,” as reported on RA. Included within is a film score from several years ago that he wrote for his own script.
According to the label, the three LPs are not albums in the “traditional sense”; rather the concept is to “release the contents of his [Bjarki]’s burgeoning hard drives. The music might fit together like an album, but Bjarki doesn’t see it that way.”
The first full-length of the series, Б, came out in June; part three, Æ, is due out in October.
Tracklisting:
A1 Fimm Atta Atta Fimm Fimm Tveir Tveir A2 Lefhanded Fuqs B1 +4531704090 2 B2 2366262lhkjdgh.aif C1 AFLKILL C2 EL D1 Ghentleman Render 2 D2 Gory Ryebread E1 Thumb E2 Fkakafsnow Tromma 2012 F1 Basketball Smile (Bbbbbb mix) F2 YYKYE
Lefthanded Fuqs is scheduled for on September 23 release.
First up on September 12 is The Dance remixed part 1, a four-tracker that sees some impressive interpretations of material taken from The Dance, a live mix from Sebastian Mullaert (a.k.a Minilogue) and label head Ulf Eriksson that dropped last year. Two of these reworks come from Joey Anderson and Markus Suckut, while Mullaert himself serves up the remaining two as Wa Wu We.
November 14 will see the release of The Dance remixed part 2, another four-tracker that features more remixes of The Dance material; this time they come from Efdemin, Voices From The Lake (a.k.a. Donato Dozzy and Neel) and Ulwhednar (the collaborative project of Abdulla Rashim and Varg).
X – Colours, the final part of this remix series, will arrive between these two releases on October 1. The double-pack consists of six new interpretations of tracks from X, the label’s ten-year anniversary compilation that came out in March. Sebastian Mullaert, Dorisburg, Max Loderbauer, and more all feature.
More information, including tracklistings and release dates, can be found below.
Tracklistings:
The Dance remixed part 1 [Release date: September 12]
A1. Movement (Joey Anderson remix) A2. Fusion (Wa Wu We reduction) B1. Fusion (Markus Suckut remix) B2. Movement (Wa Wu We strip)
X – Colours [Release date: October 17]
A. Jonsson & Alter – Brevet Hem (Sebastian Mullaert remix) B1. Jason Fine – Workin’ it Out (Porn Sword Tobacco Conga Wok) B2. Mokira – Axis Audio (Echospace Model II) C1. TM404 – 303_303_303_606_606 (Dorisburg Remix) C2. Mokira – Manipulation Musik (Sa Pa Final Descent) D. Tyler Friedman – Wallouian (Max Loderbauer Remix)
The Dance remixed part 2 [Release date: November 14]
A1. Movement (Efdemin remix) A2. Fusion (Wa Wu We remix) B1. Fusion (Voices From the Lake Tropical Thunders Mix) B2. Fusion (Ulwhednar remix)
Luca Saporito and Anthony Middleton (a.k.a. Audiofly) are set to launch Flying Circus Recordings, a new digital-only label that opens this month.
The label’s name stems from the Barcelona-based duo’s Flying Circus party series, which is celebrating a decade in operation this year with extensive global touring. The launch of the label also signals the closing of Supernature, the pair’s former imprint that boasts a discography of around 50 digital, vinyl and CD releases following its 2007 inception.
The first release on the label will come from the label heads themselves, entitled She Gave Me Love, a two-tracker with features vocalist Georgina Lewis.
Tracklisting:
01. She Gave Me Love 02. Don’t Explain feat. Georgina Lewis
She Gave Me Love is scheduled for August 12 release.
For more information on Audiofly, check out last year’s in depth interview with the Saporito and Middleton here.
Curved Light is the project of Peter Tran, an Austin-based artist who honed his skill in the D.C./Baltimore experimental rock bands Hume and Les Rhinocéros. Tran’s two current projects, Curved Light and the collaborative project HD Sunrise—alongside Wilson Kemp—trade in visceral, psychedelic sound experiments—music to awaken the mind.
The latest tape to land under the Curved Light moniker is Prismatic / Loomstate, a 14-track excursion in left-field sonics. The tape’s A side, Prismatic, focuses on using analog synthesizers, guitars, and effect processors to explore new texture in somewhat familiar territory. On the flipside, Loomstate, Tran explores the complex possibilities of the modular synthesizer for a heady trip into swirling electronics.
In support of the forthcoming tape—which will land on Baltimore label Gentle Reminder on August 5—XLR8R has been gifted “Undercurrent / Overlook,” a cut that twists and cascades beautifully across its three-minute runtime. You can download “Undercurrent / Overlook” via WeTransfer below, with the tape available for preorder here.
AYBEE has unveiled his second short film, “A Message,” the follow-up to his directorial debut, “The Gift,” which premiered at Washington DC’s Forward festival in 2015, and featured appearances by Levon Vincent, Fred P and Christopher Rau.
As with the prior film, ‘”A Message” is directed and scored by the Deepblak boss himself. The nine-minute dialog-free film was shot in a mysterious Berlin location. A track from the Oakland producer’s forthcoming LP, set for release in August 2016, is featured on the soundtrack.
The film was originally produced to form part of a larger project, but is now released as a standalone movie dedicated to the memory of Derrick Curtis (a.k.a Dreams From Last Night) following the North Carolina-based Deepblak artist’s death in July 2016.
AYBEE:
‘The film was originally supposed to be a lead into an upcoming project, but with the sudden passing of DFLN during post production I decided to make it a dedication to him. The film involves an encounter with a gatekeeper to the other “side” in the hopes of delivering a message.’
XLR8R Couldn't find the embed function for type: "vimeo" and source: "<iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/176614046?color=1fc2ba" width="640" height="360" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>".
As announced in June, British producer Ryan Lee West (better known as Rival Consoles) is soon to return to Erased Tapes with a new mini-album, scheduled for August 5 release.
West first released on the London-based imprint back in 2007 (the year the label was founded), and has since put out a number of EPs, as well as three full-lengths via the imprint. The forthcoming Night Melody picks up where he left off with 2015’s Howl—a deep, textured work of electronic music.
West explains the title of the release: “I found myself in a silent home, with the days getting dark very early. I’ve never before in my life been affected by the lack of light so much. I just remember it always being night time. I would either make music into the night, go out drinking with friends, or go to parties and dance into the early hours, every day, week after week, month after month, until eventually the days became brighter again.”
Ahead of the its August 5 release, Night Melody can be streamed in full via the player below.
Christian Löffler is set to release Mare, his second studio album, this coming October.
Mare follows in a similar vein to his self-released debut, 2012’s A Forest. However, while his first album was heavily sample-based, Mare is much more organic; almost each sound and every instrument is self-recorded. Among the instruments used were an old marimba, a mandolin zither, some self-modified synthesizers, and various other sound tools accumulated from his travels.
The album was recorded on the Darss peninsular, overlooking the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, in a log cabin, nestled among the jungle-like overgrowth of surrounding birch and willow trees. Many of the album’s ideas are based on field-recordings taken from these surroundings.
On top of this, several microphones were set up in the room and left to run on for whole sessions. The microphones collected everything, from tapping, singing, playing, footsteps, as well as percussive elements added on the fly such as bottles, sticks, a set of keys, or basically anything that was lying around. Sometimes he would open the sliding patio doors, where sounds from outside would blend into the mix.
The releases contains are also four tracks that feature the vocals of previous collaborator Mohna (“Haul,” “Mare,” “Vind,” “Wilderness”). In addition to this, it’s the first time that Löffler himself sings on a record (“Lid,” “Pacific,” “Nil”).
Christian Löffler:
“The meaning was not intended to be essentially different to A Forest but where the first album sometimes still felt to just be on the surface of what I can say with this project, it now feels like that I’ve come closer to the core of what I want to express.”
Tracklisting:
1. Myiami 2. Haul 3. Mosaics 4. Neo 5. Youth 6. Lid 7. Mare 8. Athlete 9. Vind 10. Silk 11. Nil 12. Swim 13. Krone 14. Pacific 15. Pigment 16. Wilderness 17. The Great White Open
Mare is scheduled for October 7 release via Ki Records; “Wilderness,” track 16 from the 17-track release, can be streamed in full below.
XLR8R’s first ever official podcast was published on August 3, 2006. It came in the form of an exclusive hour-long mix by Plug Research, featuring cuts from Thomas Fehlmann, Flying Lotus, Ammoncontact and many more. In the 10 years that have passed since then—yes, this week marks an entire decade—a whole lot has changed. Firstly, the mix series that started all that time ago is now updated weekly by an artist of our choice; each submission is now shared via our channels every Tuesday of the year—without fail. XLR8R, too, has grown considerably, evolving from a San Francisco-based newsprint ‘zine to a web-only music publication with a more global audience than ever before and offices on both sides of the Atlantic.
Settling on a fitting way to mark this milestone proved to be no easy task. Initial ideas revolved around compiling a list of our favorites from the past decade and sharing these with our readers once again, but we decided against this for two reasons: it didn’t do justice to the occasion, and picking a favorite among such a diverse bunch is either going to lead to a remarkably long list or exclude too many others. After all, there has been no shortage of memorable additions to the series. Gerd Janson’s 2015 submission immediately springs to mind, as do those of Alex Smoke, Nicolas Jaar, Helena Hauff and, more recently Andrew James Gustav—but there really is something in there for everyone. Even mentioning these names leaves out some of the leading pioneers in the global scene, artists like Daniel Bell, Laurent Garnier, Gaslamp Killer and Floorplan, all of whom have submissions that can be checked out if and when you please. Picking favorites just wasn’t going to cut it.
After some careful consideration we also concluded that we wanted to serve up some new music for the occasion—and that sparked the following plan. Beginning today, Monday, August 1, and ending on Saturday, August 6, we are going to share a brand new mix for your listening pleasure. And to reflect XLR8R’s growth into a global media outlet, each of these submissions will be delivered from a different continent; the artists chosen to mark this occasion with us all originate from a different corner of the globe. The task for them was simple: to compile a mix between 90-120 minutes that best represents their musical roots. There will be six mixes, one for each continent (barring Antartica, as this proved beyond challenging).
Up first, on behalf of Australia/Oceania, is Seekae.
Australian trio Seekae operate with a less-is-more approach—quality over quantity. In the nine years that have passed after 2008’s stunning debut album, The Sound Of Trees Falling on People, they’ve released two more LPs—namely 2011’s +Dome and 2014’s The Worry—three EPs, and a single. It’s certainly not an astounding rate of output by any means, but the quality of those releases is something to behold. The debut, for example, was championed by FBi Radio as one of the albums of the decade, followed up by a lauded sophomore LP that received four Australian Independent Music Award nominations. The latest LP, The Worry, was the first time the band worked with vocals from frontman Alex Cameron, and it resulted in a deeply personal and poignant record that collected a near-perfect score from RA, an Album of the Year nod from the Herald Sun, and an SMAC Award for Song of the Year for single “Test & Recognise.” With every release, the band finds a way to refine its sound presents yet another new way to relay its message.
But to look at the discography is only half the story: long before they released anything official the band members made a name for themselves with a visceral live set that wowed audiences across Australia through a fusion of bass-heavy outings, off-kilter beats, and unexpected live manipulation. Writing those tracks for the live show resulted in their debut album and, now, it is the live show that takes album cuts and morphs them into cascading memories of their former selves.
The podcast, like Seekae’s own music, is a set of loose and organic tunes that read like an autobiography of their combined influences; it’s a cohesive collection of garage, grime, electro, house, and techno that could quite easily pass as the band playing themselves.
Q&A (Answered by George Nicholas from Seekae)
When and where was the set recorded? Last week, in my studio in Sydney.
What equipment did you use? Ableton, mouse, and keyboard.
Did you have a specific idea/mood that you wanted to express? Mostly just a bunch of tracks I’ve been listening to lately.
How did you approach this mix in comparison to a regular DJ set? Because it’s not necessarily for the club, things are a little more dynamic than usual. I also popped quite a few tracks by Sydney-based/Australian artists in there.
What have you got coming up this year? Should be a single coming out through Future Classic later this year 😀
Tracklisting:
01. Corin “Wave Systems” [Speaker Footage] 02.Tom Ellard “Anthem 82” [Dark Entries] 03. Huerco S. “Battery Tunnel” [Purple Trax] 04. Rhythmic Theory “Shores of Caladan” [Ancient Monarchy] 05. Beat Spacek “I Wanna Know” (Seven Davis Jr. Midnight Remix) [Defected Records] 06. Caribou “Mars” [City Slang] 07. Mickey Pearce “Jersey” [81] 08. Simo Cell “Piste jaune” [Livity Sound Recordings] 09. Autechre “Montreal” [Warp Records] 10. Strict Face “Alice” (Peace Edit) [Gobstopper Records] 11. Skee Mask “Shady Jibing” [Ilian Tape] 12. Horizontal Ground “Ghosts on Acid” [Horizontal Ground] 14. Conqueror “Highest Order” [Lobster Boy] 15. Anthony Rother “Destroy Him My Robots” [Data Punk] 16.Bambounou “Deepstaria” [50 WEAPONS] 17. Cliques x Dro Carey “Knave” [Unreleased] 18. Bandshell “Rise Em” [Hessle Audio] 19. Grievous Angel feat. Rubi Dan “Move Down (VIP)” [Sonic Dragon] 20. Cop Envy “Klatter 2” [Unreleased] 21. Pangaea “Fatalist” [Hemlock Recordings] 22. Pinch “Qawwall” [Planet Mu] 23. Mark Pritchard “Where Do They Go, The Butterflies” [Warp Records]
