We’ve always prided ourselves on making sure you get the widest variety of sounds in electronic music with each new column, but this month, the contrasts are extra stark. Yin and yang, dark and light, hardcore and ambience are all here—sometimes all in one release! There’s brutal hyperspeed psychedelic techno from Romania; French-Australian cyberpunk acid; and British-Spanish ambient trap dreaming. But wait, there’s more! There’s celebratory brass and bass from Ghana, pure Balearic sunshine from Ireland, joyous Detroit house, and the inimitable summer-in-London-City sound of UK garage. As ever, if you want to sample it all, hit play at the top and let it roll!
Gafacci & Sam Interface
Public Information
Sam Interface is the British bass champion known for his Trinidadian soca fusions with Jus Now, as well as the high-energy global bass/rave of the label he founded with Ahadadream in 2017, More Time. And Gafacci is the endlessly inventive Ghanaian producer who seems to find new rhythmic twist, no matter what tempo he’s working at. Sam went to Ghana to record with him, and it sounds like they had a very good time. The resulting seven tracks here are pure celebration, from massed horn sections to slithering grime bass to dazzling percussion interplay. It’s a non-stop carnival of sound.
As’teka Nahuatl
Pyscho Acous’teka
This UK-based Romanian producer has a sound that’s firmly rooted in the “teknival” scene of illegal free raves around Europe. Its a stripped-bare throb with one foot in industrial techno, the other in psychedelic trance. And As’teka Nahuatl stands head-and-shoulders above much of the purely functional music in this world; his sounds boast gnarled, complex surfaces—he says he tries to make it sound “as if they are speaking.” This makes for warped grooves that are engaging, even if you aren’t 72 hours into flinging your body around in a remote field. They’re also superbly disturbing—especially on the lean, mean, hyper-speed “Microdōt.”
Kuvera B x dyLAB
Ciudad Ruidosa
Frenchman Kuvera B specializes in sonically complex hardcore, while Brit-in-Australia dYLAB tends to minimalist hardware acid. Together for the endlessly prolific and strange Dutch label NY Haunted, their different approaches flow together to create an alchemical reaction. Over these six tracks, the beats judder, shuffle, and slam—endless crackling detail buzzing around them, as if on some jerry-rigged cyberpunk contraption, while dyLAB’s acid tones pump through it all like bloodflow.
Less-O
Cri du Cœur
Maxime Ausell from the arty city of Nantes in Northwest France is the younger brother of Simon Aussell, aka Simo Cell, and has joined the family business of bass music with aplomb. Here, he traverses high-definition, percussive club music—but with more emphasis on Latin-Caribbean rolling syncopation across various tempos. It’s crisp, crunchy and instant, especially on the five-minute title track, which crackles with cinematic, cosmic drama.
Shy One
“Gyallis Spira” b/w “TNTC”
Londoner Mali Larrington-Nelson first started making grime in her early teens. In the intervening years, she’s become a DJ and producer of extraordinary depth and breadth, but she’s never lost the vital sense of directness. Thus these two tracks for Glasgow label Numbers. Both are built on an acid house framework, and evolve complex structures as they twist and turn through all kinds of funk instrumentation, deft sample-editing, and surprisingly emotional moments. But at every turn, they still bust out of the speakers with a powerful, instant impact.
Solo Jane
“Lying to Myself“
It’s incredible how—30 years from the first inklings of the UK garage scene, and 25 from its peak popularity—the music is still the sound of London in summer. This is a perfect example of a tune that multiple generations can instantly vibe to. A super-slinky 2-step beat, a nimble pizzicato string riff á la classic Rodney Jerkins or Timbaland, absolutely mammoth bass tones, and this smart, bittersweet song delivered with attitude still hits the spot perfectly. Truly this is British folk music for the 21st century.
Ben Hauke
Club Cute
Vinyl LP
And talking of bass music as folk music: South Londoner Ben Hauke joins the dots through all the styles that make up the very fabric of the city on his long-awaited debut album. He does a beautiful bit of soulful UK garage, too—featuring the inimitable Katy B. But he also touches on jungle, jazz, dub, dancehall, raw and unforgiving house grooves, broken beat—all of it flowing together with the deftness of a great DJ. Indeed, DJ technique—cutting and scratching, sudden EQ tweaking—is all over this. But so is absolutely remarkable musicianship and sound design. Conceptually and artistically it’s incredible. It also simply bangs.
House of Hits
Work That
Vinyl LP
In which two Detroit legends—Ladymonix and Waajeed—ably demonstrate how there’s no need to choose between “deep” and “party-rocking.” Over three tracks, they groove, bump, flex, and funk, with every high-hat and bass tone right in your face. But the finesse of the production and innate understanding of repetition make it a brilliantly hypnotic affair. There’s also a floaty-light breakbeat rave space-jazz remix of the title track, just to add spice at the end of a sterling EP.
NKISI
The Altar
Cassette
You don’t need track titles like “Python & Prophecy” and “A Path Appears” to catch on to the fact that this is ritualistic music. London-based Congolese Belgian musician Melika Ngombe Kolongo, aka NKISI, has been carving her own path through magical techno for over a decade now, and continues to find new and perplexing moods to explore. Early in this EP there are strong hints of older Belgian coldwave and EBM, surrounded by ghostly miasmas and subliminal sounds that come at you like insects. As it goes on, it becomes less tethered to genre and turns into a very distinct type of rhythmic mesmerism.
Iceboy Violet & Nueen
You Said You’d Hold My Hand Through the Fire
Vinyl LP, Compact Disc (CD)
Manchester-based artist/MC/producer Iceboy Violet navigates the weird shadowy spaces where trap and drill overlap with more abstract sound-making. Now, collaborating with Madrid electronic musician Nueen, they’ve reached altogether new levels of sophistication. This album plays like an audio drama of inner thoughts, unfolding as a relationship progresses. They’re hazy and dreamy, yet hit emotional notes so precise their force can catch you off-guard. There are hints of predecessors like King Midas Sound, Space Afrika, and GAIKA; but the ASMR detail and grand sweep of this album mark it out as a new high-water mark.
Rob Smith
The Blue & Red Tapes Vol. 2
Sometimes it’s the low-key musicians who startle you most. Bristolian Rob Smith (Smith & Mighty, More Rockers, RSD, etc.) is almost apologetic in the description of this collection, saying that these are mere studio offcuts, and might be a bit odd for most. In truth, this is just a mind-blowingly great record. It’s mostly classic Bristol trip-hop, with sprinklings of sunshine-y house, a few more uptempo breaks, and tracks that hint at deeper dubstep. But despite the fact the collection spans three decades, what you’ll notice is the consistent musical personality—a genial warmth and natural sense of groove and space, which makes them all part of a greater whole completely above and beyond any genre conventions.
100 Poems
Everything’s Possible When You Balearic
Incredibly, we get a second album in just six months from Dublin producer and multi-instrumentalist Mike Wilson—and it’s jam-packed with all the eclecticism and pursuit of peak experiences that defined the Balearic aesthetic in the ‘80s and early ‘90s. Dub echoes, house momentum, Beatles-y chords and string arrangements, lots of bongos and shakers, funk guitar licks—it meanders from dreamy bliss-out to reach-for-the-sun euphoria, but at every moment is exquisitely put together and clearly done from the heart.
