November 3rd, 2009
Sonic Router, arguably the best blog devoted to dubstep and its tributaries, interviews Mono/Poly about his inspirations (Timbaland, Neptunes, the Thimble), his first time at Low End Theory and his apparent love of metaphysics. They also got him to make a ridiculously good mix featuring himself, Flying Lotus, Gaslamp Killer, and others. If you don’t download, you neither pass go, nor collect $200. In fact, you probably aren’t fit to play the Monopoly game at McDonald’s.
Download:
ZIP: Mono/Poly-Sonic Router Mix (Left-Click)
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October 29th, 2009
Robot Koch. The name sounds like a concept album Lupe Fiasco would conceive were he ever dropped from Atlantic and sent down to Triple A to rap for the label of choice for late-period Mobb Deep side-projects (I refuse to call it E1-it’s not a vegetable juice blend, it’s a record label). Straight out of Berlin, the android born Robert Koch, is slated to drop his first solo full-length, Death Star Droid, following his work in “critically acclaimed band Jahcoozi and post rock/hiphop outfit The Tape vs RQM” (his hyperbole, not mine.)
Originally a hardcore drummer who incubated a love of hip-hop the proper way (via Enter the 36 Chambers), the traces of Koch’s percussionist roots loom large on Death Star, with that rugged boom-bap clap blending nicely with the wobbly dubstep textures and squealing synth lines. Think a Teutonic Nosaj Thing or Hudson Mohawke if he preferred frankfurters to haggis. Koch has already received endorsements from Gaslamp Killer, Mary Anne Hobbs, and Modeselektor. Recently, Flying Lotus asking him to drop a Brainfeeder Podcast, where Koch featured some righteous Fela Kuti and rare jazz cuts, showing off the eclecticism of his bag of tricks. Follow his advice and don’t sleep, Koch is probably the best robot since Japanese Robot Santa Claus.
Download:
MP3: Robot Koch-”Robots Don’t Sleep Mix” (Left-Click)
MP3: Robot Koch-”Death Star Droid”
MP3: Robot Koch-”Brainfeeder Mix”
Posted in Robot Koch, Dubstep | 1 Comment »
October 20th, 2009
In ongoing proof that the British are a superior culture contrasted to us benighted Yankees, the BBC 1Xtra station has started a new show hosted by Redlight entitled “In New 1Xtra DJ’s We Trust.” Rightfully, they entrusted Bristol bass behemoth, Joker with a slot on the first program, and midway through the three hour show he drops a mix of blistering dubstep, drum and bass, and house featuring Zinc, Toddla T, and Benga. The whole show is worth listening to though, with garage legend MJ Cole coming through dropping a similarly scorching set.
And we have…DJ Khaled.
Download:
MP3: In New 1Xtra DJs We Trust (10/19/09)– Guest mixes by Joker and MJ Cole (Left-Click)
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October 15th, 2009
Jneiro Jarel, perhaps best known to PoW readers as the dude behind the intermittently excellent Khujo Goodie collabo, Georgiavania, stepped to Mary Anne Hobbs ever-essential Radio One show last night and dropped this outstanding mix, featuring tracks from King Tubby, Burial, and The Bug. Plus, a plethora of remixes and original cuts recorded under his Dr. Who Dat? alias. Unfortunately, he neglected to play instant fiddle-rap classic “The Grussle,” which I imagine would play well in the United Kingdom and any place where people are prone towards kilts.
Download: (via Core News)
ZIP: Mary Anne Hobbs Experimental Show 10.15.2009: Jneiro Jarel & DJ G
Posted in Mary Anne Hobbs, Dubstep | 1 Comment »
October 14th, 2009
The third of the Bristol purple triumvirate, Guido, nee Guy Middleton, throws a symphonic slurve across the dubstep template. While his colleagues veer towards hip-hop and video game inflected soundscapes, Guido’s tunes reflect his training in both classical and jazz piano. Not to say that the gamer and rap inclinations are absent–after all, the Punch Drunk recording artist openly touted his Final Fantasy fandom in the RA feature that ran last month. I’m unsure how that translates to English ears, but in America, that statement is roughly equivalent to owning Star Trek stationery. Inevitably, the nerds always win.
Because there is little that isn’t winning about last year’s breakthrough “Orchestral Lab/”Way U Make Me Feel” 12″ and the 29 minute mix Guido compiled earlier in ‘09. A stoned Sleestak symphony– or a vision quest for kids raised under the Reagan years. Sheets of slanting synths, mean, buzzing drums, and dive-bombing violins sliding in for a clean landing. I suppose I like this sort of music so much because it sounds stranded, marooned between modalities, styles and shapes. A bastard of Two-Step, Dub-Step, Hip-Hop, 8-Bit video game music, and classical. Not the sublimated retro-fetishism of Memory Tapes, Washed Out, and Delorean, but the fractured alchemy that bubbled in the skulls of those Nintendo and hip-hop headed 80s babies. I understand why the guy liked Final Fantasy so much–this stuff is addictive.
Download:
MP3: Guido-”Orchestral Lab”
MP3: Guido-”Way U Make Me Feel”
ZIP: Guido-29 Minute Mix (Left-Click)
Posted in Guido, Dubstep | 1 Comment »
October 6th, 2009
Bakersfield is Buck Owens and Merle Haggard territory. A dust-choked, sun-split farm town of about 300,000 people. Geographically, it is roughly 100 miles north of Los Angeles. Culturally, it is about 10,000. If you look hard enough, you can find 10 gallon-hats, spurs, rodeos, and most terrifying of all, vast hordes of people who pre-ordered Sarah Palin’s book. The most famous band to emerge from Bakersfield in the last 20 years is Korn. Not only would you not expect to find one of the brightest lights of wonky/dubstep/beat-culture in Bakersfield, you’d be hard-pressed to find anything vaguely hip-hop. Unless you count that time that Korn had Ice Cube on their album. We won’t count that.
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Posted in Mono/Poly, Low End Theory, Dubstep | 8 Comments »
September 30th, 2009
Photo via RA
Gemmy’s Myspace features a YouTube clip of the introduction to the Back to the Future II Nintendo game. For this, he is the darkhorse of the bass brigade. While gawky geeky American twenty-somethings re-construct childhood via cassette noise tapes and Dan Deacon’s artery-clogging electronic twaddle, Gemmy, straight out of Bristol, takes two-step, Dre’s hydraulic funk, and 8-Bit’s right angles, and crams it into a blender with blades as sharp as Sonic the Hedgehog’s hair. This is nostalgia not for the sake of self-congratulatory winking remembrance, but to channel a child’s notion of infinity. Like all visionary music, Gemmy’s sounds limitless, both futuristic and familiar, the sort of thing that seems like a logical conclusion but one that you never could’ve predicted. He remembered the rules of “Regulate”–the rhythm is the bass (though it remains uncertain how the bass can be the treble.) Maybe he just needs to grow a beard and wear spectacles.
Download:
MP3: Gemmy-”BK 2 The Future”
MP3: Gemmy-”Bass Transmitter”
MP3: Gemmy-”FACT Mix #25″ (Left-Click)
Posted in Gemmy, Dubstep | 1 Comment »
September 29th, 2009
For those interested in the burgeoning Bristol Purple scene, Richard Carnes’ Resident Adviser piece provides the most in-depth look at Joker, Guido, and Gemmy yet. I wish that the crew didn’t have names that read straight out of a never-aired “Batman Goes to Italy” episode (60s camp-edition), but I’ll manage. The piece confirms that a Joker full-length is on its way, one which portends to build on the strength of the instant-classic “Digidesign” and “Do It” singles.
The article also has a quote from Kode 9 that is the best description of Liam McLean’s music that I’ve heard: “Wiley stuck in an elevator with…Cameo. You hear his whiney pitch-bent synths on a dance floor, it’s like some kind of group electrocution taking place. Those synths sound like a big laser frying everyone’s brains.” If you’re anything like me and looking for a stop-gap until Joker becomes the next UK dance phenomenon that fails to cross-over in the U.S. (a.k.a. The Aphex Twin Memorial Award), you’ll become obsessed with these tracks from the Kapsize EP, his 2007 debut that established his reputation as one of the scene’s leading lights and easily the best Joker since Jack Nick.
Download:
MP3: Joker-”The Bop”
MP3: Joker-”Stuck in the System”
Posted in Joker, Dubstep | No Comments »
September 23rd, 2009
Back before Timbaland abandoned the pursuit of futuristic 33rd Century R&B for tepid Buck Rogers-lite, ray-gun rap (or as normal people refer to it, America’s most popular album two weeks running), he laced Missy protege/possible paramour/self-love advocate Tweet with one of the best beats he never slid towards Aaliyah. Hudson Mohawke–who you might remember from earlier this month–released a white label only remix of “Oops” earlier this year, re-working Timbaland’s twerked funk into a wobbly dubstep behemoth. On the B-Side, he flipped Ashanti’s “Still On It,” thus reclaiming her from past sins inflicted from Ja Rule collabos. Both tracks offer a unique vision for R&B, far removed from the majority of the sub T-Pain rhythm and bullshit that passes for soul these days. And by this, I mean not having to see that topless wastrel Ray J on everything from the New Boyz to the new Warren G jaunt.
MP3: Hudson Mohawke-”Oops”
MP3: Hudson Mohawke-”Still On It”
Posted in Dubstep | 3 Comments »
September 10th, 2009
The line between Dubstep, Purple, Wonky, and today’s token dance designation du jour is growing increasingly nebulous. The title is mainly a poorly veiled excuse for me to link to this old Sunny D commercial and pose existential questions about what sort of mother would allow their children to drink “purple stuff,”why rollerblading was ever considered cool, and how Sunny D’s foul fructose swill was somehow seen as a healthy alternative. Ah, the late 80s, a time of unbridled optimism and can-do spirit.
So Hudson Mohawke–23 years old, Glasgow-raised, Primo and DITC-obsessed, born to an American DJ dad who ostensibly preferred his first-born with a brogue than as a “bro.” I only discovered Hudson a few weeks ago thanks to Mary Anne Hobbs’ Wild Angels comp, but according to reader/rapper Nick Sweepah, he headlines massive block parties in Australia when he isn’t busy producing tracks for Magr and crafting the Polyfolk Dance EP, his excellent Warp debut released earlier this spring. Last night, I watched him absolutely incinerate the Low End Theory with beats so springy and spongy that the dance floor felt like a diving board.
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Posted in Dubstep | 6 Comments »
