Listen to Yamaneko’s “Primrose Island”

Hear a cut from the grime-influenced producer’s debut album, due later this month on Local Action.

It’s been a year of brilliant music from Local Action, with debut albums from Slackk and DJ Q sitting alongside killer singles and EPs from Finn, Inkke and Shriekin. However, it’s the forthcoming debut album from Yamaneko that’s perhaps lodged itself deepest in our collective affections. A producer with a love for both grime and new age and meditational tapes, the music he makes fits somewhere right between the two, as staccato rhythms and heavy sub bass ring out among aqueous sine wave melodies. The format of Pixel Wave Embrace also reflects his interest in tapes, with the album arriving on cassette format.

Ahead of the release of Pixel Wave Embrace on November 24, we’re proud to present album track “Primrose Island”. Streaming below, the track provides one of the album’s more serene moments, referencing the music of classic Japanese RPGs as much as it does grime. It might not be the kind of track you imagine hearing notable Yamaneko fans Mumdance or Logos dropping in their sets at peak time, but it ably demonstrates his knack for crafting uncanny, weightless melodies. If you’d like to grab a cassette copy, they can be bought for a reasonable price at the Local Action store, while those without tape players will also be pleased to hear the album will be available digitally.

If you’re keen to hear more from Yamaneko, we recommend the floatation tank sounds of his Pixel Healing Spa mix, part of a trilogy including the album itself and the Pixel Juice mix released in March.