Featured DJ Chart: Instra:mental

Last week we revealed that UK duo Al Bleek and Kid Drama – aka Instra:mental – will release their debut album, entitled Resolution 653, next year via their own Nonplus imprint. They first came to the attention of Juno Plus a while back via their genre hopping Autonomic podcast series with dBridge, which allowed them to pursue their passion for the forward thinking end of D&B, dubstep and techno.

This year they combined a Fabric residency with a slew of festival dates, and still managed to release a healthy mix of 12″s on their label from the likes of Jimmy Edgar, ASC, Actress and Kassem Mosse among others. They rounded off a fine 2010 with a gong at this week’s DJ Mag Best Of British awards ceremony in London, taking the prize for Best Compilation for their Autonomic Fabriclive mix.

They’ll no doubt be in celebratory mood at the Eastern Electrics New Year’s Eve party with Damian Lazarus, Seth Troxler, Jamie Jones, Joker & MC Nomad, Roska and more, so we called up the lads to find out what tunes they’ve been feeling lately – expect a few of the beasts listed below to strip some paint from the walls come the 31st…

1. Kassem Mosse – Hi Res (Nonplus)

“We love this record and were proud to release it – the great drum work and really lo-fi, old drum and bass/Detroit feel to it made it instantly appealing.”

2. Ramdanman – Work them (Swamp 81)

“A massive track that never fails to get a dancefloor working! This has been in our sets for months now, and will continue to stay there for a while yet.”

3. Jimmy Edgar – My Balance (Nonplus)

“More well produced late night sleaze from Jimmy, perfect for one-on-one dancefloor encounters!”

4. Riya – Seems Like (Autonomic)

“This is an Autonomic classic, whenever this gets dropped in the clubs, the girls always sing along and push up on the men!”

5. Braiden – The Alps (Doldrums)

“We’ve been playing this for quite a few months, probably our favourite ‘ Mutant House ‘ track around at the moment, and again, this works so well in the clubs.”

6. Pearson Sound – Blanked (Hessle Audio)

“Amazing stuff from Pearson Sound, we’ve been playing this last track for a while now and it goes down so well, the breakdown always makes people pull out their lighters and when the bass drops back in everyone goes crazy. The perfect way to finish a set.”

7. Tyrez – Breath Of Desire (Dolly)

“Well, we love this track and love this label. This record is just beautiful for clubs or home listening – Chicago vibes and makes you think about summer, which is a good thing for anyone.”

8. Instra:mental – Zones (Semantica)

“This is a label we’ve wanted to work with for some time now, these two tracks were built for the label itself, and we liked them so much that we are also putting them on our forthcoming album on Nonplus. They are more electronic based tracks, not really conforming to the rules and regulations of today’s dance music. They bring back the feelings of the golden era of electronic music from the 90’s for us.

9. Distance – Skys Alight (Autonomic)

“A track from Distance at 170, a different tempo than we are used to from him. Inspired by the Autonomic movement he really went in on this and did a great job. It also featured on the Autonomic FabricLive 50 mix.”

10. Instra:mental, Skream & dBridge – Arcacia Avenue (Autonomic)

“This may bit a little bit old now but, this track still makes clubs go wild and ALWAYS gets a rewind!”