Best Of 2012: Top 100 EPs/singles

This year saw anonymous collective Old Apparatus move from Deep Medi to create their own imprint – Sullen Tone – on which to release their own material. The four records that were released this year provided some of the year’s most exquisite artwork as well as some of its best music. Perhaps the most striking was the Realise EP – in actuality a solo record from the collective member known only as LTO. Considering previous releases had trod the path of industrial dubstep and ghostly hip-hop, the 4/4 golem stomp of “Chicago” and the Autechre style breakbeats of “Holding” demonstrated that their influences and the scope of the collective’s project are wider than anyone first imagined.

What with the influx of tough British techno in 2012, it felt at times like the German dominance was starting to come to an end. However, a few German producers shone through this year with their fresh take on the Berghain sound, and Answer Code Request was one of them. One of two 12”s for Marcel Dettmann’s MDR imprint, the title track delivered an effective slice of Equalized style techno with steely snares and ecstatic chords, but really it was all about the B-Side. “Biokinetic” offered a suitably organic sound, whose rubbery bassline and congas had a depth and malleable groove not seen in much techno this year, while “Untitled” took things into breakbeat late 90s IDM territory. Few contemporary techno producers made a record as effortlessly wide ranging as this in 2012.

Although the B-Side to this 12” from South London producer Wbeeza, “Billy Green Is Ded”, did a nice job of creating a foggy Moodymann-inspired house jam, it was “Peckham Fly” that stood out. A tweaked out combination of syncopated, drifting metallic blips and squealing synth blasts, it sits somewhere between UK funky and (good) tech house, and although it sounds like the kind of thing you could imagine Actress making if he was playing it straight, “Peckham Fly” is by no means a conventional dance track.

This year saw the fruitful collaboration between Blawan and The Analogue Cops get its own proper name: Parassela. Although inaugurated by a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it white label this summer which led to the usual cries of elitism in the RA forum, they swiftly followed it up with this EP for Vae Victis which was arguably the best of their collaborations to date. It’s also a significantly more experimental record in places, with “Never A Night Rest” throwing abstract sound waves and distorted synth blasts in among its jerky tom-led rhythm, while Blawan’s influence on proceedings was more obvious, with the title track having all the demonic qualities of his Hinge Finger and Black Sun missives, and the 140bpm “Bad Treatment” guiding the Italian duo back towards the 140bpm Mills-inspired techno of their earlier Xenogears productions. In a year where the descriptor “raw” became increasingly commonplace, these guys cut through the noise and showed the rest how it’s meant to be done.

Delsin going house? It doesn’t seem that strange now, but when the techno-centric label first announced a new house-focused series earlier this year, it caused something of a stir. Launching with the homespun, fuzzy sounds of Gerry Read was a shrewd move for the label, and, equally, just rewards for the young British producer whose rickety, homespun electronics had previously been showcased on 2nd Drop and Fourth Wave. Stylistically, the four tracks on Yeh Come Dance continue the mission statement Read has already laid out; there’s the claustrophobic title track, then “Crawlspace”, which is marked by wayward sample placing, and “Bozza”, on which a complex arrangement of brushed drums, piano and other sonic debris are strewn liberally around a jazz fuelled mix. “Crooked” rounds off the EP by distilling all these feelings into one track of brilliant, strung out strangeness.

Any way you look at it, 2012 has been a huge year for Madeto, and his ascendency can be traced back to Bugler Gold Pt 1, the first release on Will Bankhead and Joy Orbison’s Hinge Finger imprint. The release showcased Madteo’s idiosyncratic nature, from the slicked back cover portrait to the disjointed grooves contained within, with the title track an anaesthetised take on Detroit beatdown. “(Biz R Us (Whore Powers Resolution)” which follows it, sees a clunking rhythmic machine maintaining a thunderous forward momentum despite its sharper edges being coated in a soporific blanket of Chloroformed cotton wool. The B-Side delivers a further surprise in the library music inspired oddity of “Scream Seq”; “Xtra Loose Change (2010 refix)” meanwhile, is the sort of relentlessly deep house that’s held together with little more than rhythm and pure atmosphere. Madteo was given centre stage here – and he’s been shining in the limelight ever since.

With its detuned organ riff twisted around a heaving, viscous basement beat and shuffling percussion, “Bang’t” was arguably the best example of Dance Mania revivalism this year, and easily the most gleefully demented release to come from the Clone camp in 2012. B-Side “Fire Extinguisher” was possibly even more unhinged, throwing in some toy town sirens into the mix. That Gerd has now been tapped up to do three Geeeman remixes since this 12” was released, one of which was for Will Saul’s Aus Music, speaks volumes about how well this release went down.

One of the more memorable Skrillex related stories of the year was that of Objekt drawing attention on Twitter to a poor soul who had opened for the Grammy award winning sensation and had attracted a hail of bottles on playing “Cactus”. True or not, it makes sense that “Cactus” would be deployed at a Skrillex gig; it’s more sonic weapon than music, playing with the conventions of “wobble” dubstep to create something faintly ridiculous but also deadly serious. “Porcupine” meanwhile saw the producer indulge his tendencies for militant, jackhammer techno, creating the kind of track that gives Surgeon a run for his money. Objekt may not have had the most prolific year, but when your only release is this good, there’s no danger people will forget about you anytime soon.

Xosar arrived out of nowhere in 2012, following her debut 12” on L.I.E.S. in January with the Ghosthaus EP on Rush Hour, released just a couple of weeks later. Although the record was notable for two Legowelt remixes – the version of “Rainy Day Juno Jam” provided a stunning end to Norman Nodge’s Berghain 06 mix CD – the original material remained the highlight and showcased a serious new talent. “Ghosthaus” was perhaps as spectral and ephemeral as house music gets, barely three minutes wrought with iridescent emotion. Conversely, “Rainy Day Juno Jam” was one of the year’s most cautiously joyous tracks, the synthesiser referenced in the title providing a melodic flourish while heavenly voices trapped in a temporal void call out through a stripped down rhythm. All of this was presented on a clear red 12” housed in a transparent sleeve and complemented by a smartly designed insert, making it a fully-formed mission statement of Xosar’s sonic and visual aesthetic.

The seldom seen collaboration between L.I.E.S. chief Ron Morelli and seasoned producer Jason Letkiewicz returned in 2012 with their most malevolent offering to date. Previously an outlet for straight to tape house throwdowns, their Eliminator 12” features two drawn out odysseys that occupied the vast, sludgy wasteland between electro and acid, and perhaps served as the finest example of L.I.E.S.’s unflinching and adventurous ethos. The Dogs have clearly devised a smart formula, one that allows them to assemble a fierce beatdown groove against a backdrop of more experimental melodies and effects, and offers a glimpse at a blossoming studio partnership.

Disco Nihilist tracks have a certain visceral punch to them that make them crisp and instantly recognisable despite their rough hewn analogue construction. Moving Forward, the producer’s second EP for the consistently excellent Running Back imprint, saw Mike Taylor flip the script slightly. Whereas many of his earlier works focused on stark, alien rhythms and the ragged variations of 303 acid lines, Moving Forward was driven just as much by melody as the percussive potential of vintage drum machines. Of course, there was always some attention paid to mood and melody in Taylor’s work, it’s just that it wasn’t the most obvious feature: now he’s made it a talking point. “House Rent Boogie” set the tone, gaining most of its power from using the central melodic hook. It’s hard to say whether Moving Forward is the best Disco Nihilist release to date – his past material for Construction Paper and Running Back has been excellent – but it was a special EP, featuring his most finely crafted and melodically advanced tracks so far.

It’s telling that Jamal Moss hasn’t let the considerable rise in his stock over the past twelve months compromise his already challenging approach; instead it seems to have inspired him to dig even deeper, with illuminating results. Arriving late in the year, The Lost Transmissions was another welcome outing on Rabih Beaini’s Morphine Records label, arriving in the same 12 month period as his bewildering remix of Madteo’s “Freak Inspector” as part of the Redose-1 release. A reworked version of “The Lost Transmissions”, originally released in 2010 on one of the many limited CDrs Mathematics puts out, set the scene. Cut down and markedly slower than the original, the track frazzled brains even harder, yet it still doesn’t impact as strongly what followed. If you can picture a fairground in Dante’s Hell, then we’d imagine the mangled thump of “Cosmic Bebop” to be on infinite loop as the requisite carousel ride grinded away.

Last year’s Real Talk EP for Numbers saw Randomer developing his sound towards a heavy duty style of breakbeat acid techno and this year he continued to toughen up that sound with a pair of singles for Hemlock. The first was arguably our favourite; “Scruff Box” was a muscular combination of buzzsaw synths and toms pumped full of steroids, while “Get Yourself Together” combined creeping horror movie style samples with lumbering hi-hats and scythes of sweeping bass, neither of which went over four minutes in length. In a year where everyone seemed to rip off Blawan’s signature sound, and the result was a build-up of populist techno stodge, Randomer seemed to be largely untouched by the copycats, but on the strength of the year he’s had, it’s probably only a matter of time.

Claremont 56’s Paul “Mudd” Murphy turned in two stunning tweaks of Holger Czukay and U She’s “La Premiere” back in April, worming a languid shuffle into the original track from krautrock legend Czukay, who studied under Karlheinz Stockhausen and went on to co-found Can. The “Ode To Phreek” remix is a loungey track that hops along with a beguiling groove, as muted guitar strikes drive everything along behind U She’s mournful tone. The “Garden” mix meanwhile slips a more prominent kick into the mix while subtly dubbing out certain elements in a coolly executed celebration of eclecticism.

Any Other Styles is Parrish at his most esoteric and least concessionary, the title track in both long and short variants the most divisive of productions this year, splitting opinion amongst the most steadfast of Theo devotees. A production that’s been nuanced since the summer of last year, “Any Other Styles” rides rough shod through a procession of heavily diced up and processed samples lifted from an unidentified Kung Fu film Parrish was watching with his son and there’s an interesting discussion on the track’s genesis in this CDr interview for those that want to investigate further. In a year where blandness reigns supreme, the more fucked up and off the grid a record is, the more it appeals to our ears and for some of the Juno Plus editorial Any Other Styles appealed massively, for others it had the opposite effect. This is the sort of reaction Parrish was undoubtedly looking to engender.

Peverelist has always conversed with dub on his productions – but this 12”, released on the Livity Sound imprint he runs with Kowton and Asusu, saw him move further out into the territory of experimental dub techno. With the same spindly rhythmic quality as his classic “Clunk Click Every Trip”, “Salt Water” uses broken, unpredictable drum patterns as its backbone, with buoyant, iridescent chords cutting through the mix. Erosions” went even deeper, characterised by its cavernous reverb and abstract radiophonic ripples coated in dub delay, feeling of a contemporary updating of the Rhythm & Sound formula. If you were worried there was little scope for experimentation left in the realm of dub techno, look no further than this pair of tracks.

This year saw French producer Pepe Bradock break three years of original production silence with the launch of the Imbroglios series, and the debut release has remained a strong favourite for us at Juno Plus. Anyone with a BA in Bradock will know the Frenchman’s most widely acclaimed productions like “Deep Burnt” or “Life” are irregular diversions in one man’s singular take on leftfield house music. Pleasantly Imbroglios sounded like Bradock had somehow arrived at the centre point between these two opposing creative urges, drawing from both across four satisfyingly unique productions. Any 12” that is meant to be the end product of reworking the soundtrack to an imaginary film can be filed under “Pepe’s at it again”, yet his innate desire for production quirks such as the cat sampling “Inconsequent Pussy” was complemented by the hissing, lurching, stuttering arrangement of complex percussive textures and seasick chords that was “12Turn13”.

Veteran Dutch producer Aardvarck always brings a fresh angle to his productions that is constantly rewarding, and has reserved much of his best work for Rush Hour. Appearing on various outlets of the Spuistraat operation over the years, the brilliant “Nosestep” was finally surpassed in our Aardvarck shaped affections by Nubian, the producer’s induction in the No Label series Rush Hour curates. Aside from Shackleton, there are few producers who can effortlessly flaunt their capacity to drop “what you call it?” killers like the title track. Launching with the titular refrain bellowing into yawning nothing, a crunched up polyrhythmic groove soon takes control scattering in a million different directions under the thumping duress of monolithic sub bass while the recycled remnants of a lost Bernie Herman string section float in the distance. Backed with a deadly porcine ode to Todd Terry brandishing a ruff as you like concoction of jagged breaks and deep stabs, those swift enough to pick up this limited 12” will never regret it.

In June, perennially underrated producer Timothy J Fairplay compiled a Juno Plus Podcast comprised solely of his own original material and remixes. Of all the music showcased in that session, it was the string-led epic “Aim for The Yellow Sector” that stood out most to our ears; less then a month later it was released on boutique London-based imprint Emotional Response. In fact all four tracks that made up the Somebody Somewhere EP were outstanding, from the Carpenter bassline and spectral arpeggios of “Saco Bay” to the tumbling title track and the digidub brilliance of “I Do Not Believe”.

It’s not often you say a Blawan release is “slept on” – everything the Yorkshireman touches these days is the subject of feverish excitement – but it’s safe to say Long Distance Open Water Worker was Jamie Roberts’ most under-appreciated missive of the year. It would be hard to tag his debut on Frozen Border affiliates Black Sun as anything other than four exercises in resolutely grubby, dark and industrial techno – lead track “Scarborough” demonstrated Blawan’s noirish prowess for uncovering unnerving vocal samples and using the duration of the production to further bury this looped up element beneath the saturated crud of noise built up around the hollow scraping of kick drums. It set the sinister tone for what follows, with “Breathe Them Knees In” growling into life, and “Grafter Gets A Home”, whose malevolent vocal remains above the parapet of dystopian noise that bubbles underneath throughout its progression, while “6 To 6 Lick” sees Blawan let loose on the drums in schizophrenic fashion.

The work of two well-known producers wishing to remain anonymous, Ruff Draft was one of the most under the radar 12”s in this list. We won’t spoil their identities; although anyone familiar with his output will be able to place the drums of one of the involved parties, the other is much less obvious. This list has several records that looked to jungle for inspiration, but this was possibly the most visceral, with both “Lone Ranger” and “The Shining” providing tumbling breakbeat techno of the highest order, wrapping up the sheer physicality of Source Direct in a modern package.

Choosing which of Helix’s two singles this year to include in this list was a tough decision, especially given how enjoyable the revivalist grime of his Night Slugs white label release “Drum Track” was. But this release for Glasgow’s All Caps just edged it for showing the producer’s versatility; although the threadbare 8-bar of “Stacks Riddim” combined equal parts grime and rattling Steve Poindexter style drums, he also showed himself to be a mean hand at creating Equalized-inspired techno with “Honig”, a grumbling slipstream of swung drums that threatens to become engulfed by its relentless waves of incandescence.

Shadowy Duchamp acolyte Rrose came to prominence on erstwhile techno hub Sandwell District; when that institution shut its doors the producer formed his own label, Eaux, to release his own increasingly adventurous productions. Wedge Of Chastity, the fourth release on Eaux this year, was exceptional, with the spiralling keys and growling low frequencies of “Cavity” sounding like a wholly appropriate soundtrack for a descent into madness. On the flip, “Wedge” offers a more patient track, as a viscous, dubbed out bassline slowly breaks out into a searing pulse which is gradually layered with increasingly complex percussion, while “Envy” creates a distinct sense of alienation with its stuttering kick drums and thick bass coated in waves of cold delay.

In a year where Madteo’s exposure grew exponentially across releases for Hinge Finger, Wania, The Trilogy Tapes, Sahko and more, this release from Meakusma offered a dual role. Nominally a remix EP, the ReCast 12” saw Marcellus Pittman, Kassem Mosse and Anthony Shake Shakir re-interpret and rework both unreleased and released material from the Italian. Each producer brought something different to the table; in the case of Shake Shakir it gave the Detroit native a chance to flex his hip hop muscles, whilst the other two favoured more recognisable house centric revisions, though Mosse’s take on “Very Sweaty Palms” is more a total annihilation than simple remix. Of equal importance was the way this 12” coaxed you into visiting or revisiting (depending on your level of awareness) Madteo’s previous work with Sensational in order to gain a better context for what the producer is currently doing.

The Idle Hands imprint excels in putting out stripped back, functional music with a twist, and Alex Coulton’s Candy Flip was the Bristol based label’s finest release in 2012. The title track wrapped a tight beat up in impeccable sound design, from echoing cowbells to vaporous whooshes; deep and resonating, it’s the kind of understated hook that legendary tracks are made of. There’s no drop in quality on “Brooklyn” either, which starts off on a false pretence of bluesy keys and steady beat, before another one of those killer b-lines comes creeping in and the whole track opens up into another smasher. As all the previous Idle Hands releases have demonstrated, there’s no need for so many revisitations of past techniques and styles when such fresh, uncomplicated ideas can still be generated if you look hard enough for the right producers.