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Premiere: Otik – Witness (Wallwork & RZR Edit)

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May 21, 2015
New Music, Remixes
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wallwork-rzr

London duo Wallwork & RZR have burst onto the scene over the past year, garnering attention from the likes of Scratcha DVA and drawing fans to their rough-and-tumble, breaks-heavy style. Releases on Infinite Machine and Nervous Horizons set the pace and a bevy of remix work has seen the duo pop all over the place, most recently on fellow Londoner Otik‘s upcoming Emphasis EP for Infinite Machine sister label Tessier Ashpool. Built on two originals and five smashing remixes, Emphasis features a range of styles, but is built on Otik’s passion for hectic jungle, each of the two originals a heavily referential mass of breaks and miasma. On their remix of “Witness”, Wallwork & RZR slow down the proceedings to a lope, retaining the percussive, spastic thrust of the original while inflecting the whole affair with their own unique production aesthetic. Cloaka, Liar, Majora and Mutual Friend also remix tracks from Emphasis, which is out Monday, May 25. Pre-order Emphasis here.

Premiere: OR-7 – 001

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May 19, 2015
New Music
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lars-warn

 The latest themed project from the Classical Trax stable comes with a distinct Detroit bent with artists like Lars Warn, Draft Dodger, Fisky, Imaabs and Tomas Urquieta putting their respective spins on labels like Transmat and Metroplex. Out tomorrow (May 20), the Future ’95’ EP isn’t a true-to-form tribute to the aforementioned Detroit institutions, but as one of the more techno-leaning releases from the CT camp, it does bring a refreshing hybrid approach, lacing breakbeats into previously empty space and spooky melodies around dusty drums. For our money, Lars Warn, as his new side-project OR-7, contributes the highlight track, the almost-strictly percussive peak time banger “001”. Don’t let the very techno track title fool you though, Lars has an acumen for for percussive heat and him taking on the more linear form feels comfortable. Grab Future ’95’ via Classical Trax tomorrow. Art work for the tape is by Ryan Huff aka DJ SagePay.

Premiere: Pitcheno – K1. 不明白” (feat. Organ Tapes)

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May 18, 2015
New Music
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tobago-tracks

For the past year, the Watford-based Tobago Tracks label has matched UK producers with international artists in a six part EP series. So far, the label has focused on France, Turkey and the US and their latest volume, out May 26, brings China into the mix. Tobago Tracks artists Pitcheno and Organ Tapes feature, as well as Laura Inglass and Macchina as the tape touches on techno, grime and R&B in sprawling fashion. We were lucky enough to grab Pitcheno’s Organ Tapes-featuring “K1. 不明白”” for premiere, a brilliant pseudo-cover of Future and Kanye Wests “I Won”. At a loping dancehall-pace Pitcheno’s bracing production matches clattering, reverb-clad kicks with whooshes of noice as a fragile, beatific melodic quotient and children’s voices slowly build into a feverish atmosphere set around the percussive pillars. It’s a surprisingly prescient piece of contemporary pop, matching the feel good nature of Caribbean forms with an ambient sensibility and a brilliant piece of heavily processed vocal work. In a sense, it’s pop music and the quote-on-quote underground working hand in hand, but the track is removed from both contexts, both too overt in its form to work as a piece of collage/sound art and too sonically abrasive to function as a clear cut pop number. Instead, “K1. 不明白”” exists in a nether region between the two worlds, grasping at wispy elements from both and placing them inside its internal brilliant collider. Grab Tobago Tracks Vol. 4: China next Tuesday (May 26).

Premiere: Santa Muerte – Bootlegs & Edits Vol. 2

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April 30, 2015
New Music, Remixes
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santa-muerte

Back in February, we featured an Astral Plane mix from Houston duo Santa Muerte, comprised of Sines and Panchitron, that was absolutely packed full of disarming bootlegs, edits and reworks of hits in both English and Spanish. Snippets of grime and ballroom were splayed across the tape, as was a heavy amount of dembow and the volume immediately become a favorite in the car on hot Los Angeles days. That mix ended in fine form with an exciting blend of Murlo’s “Loyal” edit and “Cositas Raras” by Puerto Rican Reggaeton artist Farruko. Now, we’ve got that bootleg, along with six others from the Santa Muerte team, up for premiere and free download. Edits of Visionist, Dat Oven and False Witness sit alongside otherworldly, Mr. Mitch-esque Tinashe reworks and a bizarro “U.O.E.N.O” x “Sientelo” blend. Bootlegs & Edits Vol. 2 (Vol. 1 can be found here) is all over the place stylistically, but that’s the Santa Muerte way, an intelligent smash up of popular Caribbean sounds with on-the-cusp UK and East Coast sounds. It’s swaggering and imprecise, but so are modern metropolis’, where disparate micro-cultures, internalized sonic routines and dance run into each other on a daily basis. Stream and download Bootlegs & Edits Vol. 2 below and be sure to follow Santa Muerte on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud, etc.

  1. Dat Oven – Icy Lake (Santa Muerte Bootleg)
  2. Santa Muerte – Dimelo Ft Sir Speedy And Lumidee (Bootleg)
  3. False Witness – Makina (Santa Muerte Edit)
  4. Nicki Minaj – Only (Santa Muerte Bootleg)
  5. Santa Muerte – 24hrs (Bootleg)
  6. Santa Muerte – Cositas Rara x Lo (Edit)
  7. Tinashe – Vunerable (ft. Travis $cott) (Santa Muerte Bootleg)
  8. Visionist – Eye Try (Santa Muerte Retool)

Premiere: Stabber – Ready To Kill

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April 27, 2015
New Music
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stabber

While Lucky Beards Records calls Italy home, the hardworking label helmed by Stabber has released a good deal of quality club music over the past several years, looking to Baltimore for inspiration more often than not. The label’s latest release comes from Stabber himself and comes with collaborations with Starkey and Kozee. The Back 2 Basic EP will be released on Tuesday, April 28 (tomorrow) and we’ve got a sneak peak of “Ready To Kill”, a horn-led, hi res Bmore piece that, like much of the label’s output, toes the line between the big room and niche realms. Pre-order Back 2 Basic via iTunes here and check out “FMN”, also from the EP, here.

Premiere: Korma – Dismantle (Spurz Remix)

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April 24, 2015
New Music, Remixes
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spurz

Montreal-based label Infinite Machine has made a name for itself by working harder than the rest of the field and implementing an omnivorous approach that ignores both traditional genre barriers and geography. Next up on the docket for the label is an EP from Seattle grime provocateur Korma, titled ZGMF-X19A (a sly Gundam reference) and set for a May 11 release date. The EP, including remixes from Liar and Tomas Urquieta, can be previewed here and is thoroughly excellent, another step forward for a producer whose talents have never been in question. We’ve got an outtake from the EP, a remix from Vancouver-resident Spurz, on premiere today and having run through this rework a dozen or so times, it’s baffling it didn’t make the cut. Wobbly in terms of both production aesthetic and intended result, Spurz’s take on “Dismantle” is another cross-denominational work that doesn’t skimp on the bass weight. Whereas most “grime-meets-ballroom-meets-whatever” tracks are far more interesting in theory than they are in practice, Spurz has the wherewithal and restraint to allow the sped-up “Ha Dance” sample lay dormant until the end where it hits hardest. Grab Spurz’s “Dismantle” rework below and be sure to buy ZGMF-X19A on May 19.

Premiere: Druid Cloak – Obsidia Chroma

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April 24, 2015
New Music
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Druid-Cloak-7

The second chapter in Druid Cloak‘s Lore LP series, Lore: Book Two is an extravagant journey through an imagined world, replete with cinematic flourishes and of-the-moment beat touchstones. A soundtrack sans movie, Lore: Book Two points to a number of contemporary club production techniques before eventually removing them from context and destroying them. But unlike, say, the Janus collective who follow a similar path, Druid Cloak never really brings the songs back to the club. That’s not to say that none of Lore: Book Two can or should be played out, but the album as a coherent entity isn’t exactly suitable for peak time. Out of the entire tape, “Obsidia Chroma” might just be the track most ready for the dance, a harmonically focused journey that builds into a larger-than-life crescendo that doesn’t spare the angel vocals. You can catch Lore: Book Two via Druid Cloak’s own Apothecary Compositions on May 19 and pre-order the album here.

Premiere: GROVESTREET – Disqualified

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April 23, 2015
New Music
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grovestreet

It’s hard to believe that Rushmore‘s Trax Couture label is already at the seventh edition of its World Series, partially because each and every edition has been thoroughly on point and partially because it’s seems like only last week that the label head kicked off the series. The last three volumes have come from Air Max ’97, Akito and Dreams respectively so Vol. 7 had to come with a real punch and GROVESTREET is the perfect man to do it. Five drastically different tracks make up GROVESTREET’s World Series Vol. 7, from peak time percussive banger “Soliloquy” to “Blue Ribbon”, a bouncy, acid-tinged techno number that flips into a twinkly, beatless track midway through. And then there’s “Disqualified”, a track that announces its own grandeur within 30 seconds with a barrage of brass, sub bass and snares. Fittingly, “Disqualified” closes out Vol. 7and after the percussive madness of the previous four tracks, it could be viewed as a palette cleanser of sorts, but it could also be utilized in peak time, its swaggering cool ready to be deployed in a big room setting. GROVESTREET’s World Series Vol. 7 is out Wednesday, April 29 on Trax Couture.

Premiere: Rambow & 199? – Naughty Cat

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April 20, 2015
New Music
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aerial

Having already hosted events with Moleskin, Rushmore, Grovestreet, Rambow and more, London’s Aerial Sounds, a party throwing collective/nascent label, has begun to carve out a space in the British capitol’s crowded scene and their most recent step into releasing music, a seven track compilation called Aerobics, should only solidify that passage. With Los Angeles’ Dreams and New York’s Rambow involved, as well as label co-heads 199? and AQWEA, the tape has a bit of American flavor, both in terms of its participants and its ballroom-derived sensibility. The tape, out April 27, follows this Friday’s (April 24) Aerial 005 party, featuring Scratcha DVA in a killer headlining spot, as well as East London Club Trax. “Naughty Cat” is a co-production by Rambow & 199?, a sparse, runway-ready track that should light the floor at Power Lunches (the venue for this Friday’s venue) on fire. Find Aerobics at the Aerial Bandcamp on the 27th.

Premiere: Imaabs – Densidad Cero

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April 20, 2015
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imaabs

Last week, The FADER premiered Imaabs‘ “Voy”, the opening cut from Chilean producer Imaabs’ Distancia EP, out April 27 via NAAFI. Having played NAAFI’s inaugural New Years party/mini festival and been generally ingratiated into the Mexico City-based crew, Distancia comes as no surprise and comes off as a perfect fit for both parties. Today we’ve got “Densidad Cero”, another standout from Distancia that continues Imaabs’ reign as king of the paranoiac club. Unsettling in nature, Imaabs’ music is as mesmerizing as it is jarring and “Densidad Cero” epitomizes that approach flawlessly as a sleepy melody underscores driving, snare-filled percussion that really never ceases. It’s an aesthetic that we’ve come to recognize and love and while it has become more popular among the Soundcloud set, Imaabs’ work is unmatched in its singular vision, again making him a perfect fit for the trailblazing NAAFI squad. Distancia is out next Tuesday (4/27) and can pre-ordered here via iTunes.