The best new singles this week
New year – new singles
SINGLE OF THE WEEK
Deux – Golden Dreams ((Minimal Wave)
Such is the stature of Minimal Wave, they’re at the point where their represses of reissues are noteworthy moments. In truth, Veronica Vasicka’s label spearheaded the exploration of furtive lo-fi electronics long before it was trendy, and the jewels that have been unearthed in that time are precious in a way they never could have been without her diligent work. If you needed a record which sums up the seedy, seductive allure of the label, Deux’s Golden Dreams is Minimal Wave at its best.
Deux were French duo Gérard Pelletier and Cati Tête, who met in Lyon in the early 80s and started recording stripped back synth pop with the electric frisson that comes from a mixed gender duet. Of course the influence of The Human League, Depeche Mode et al lurks in the background of their songs, but through the fact of their rudimentary means, the music lands with its own peculiarities and the charm of the songwriting shines through.
There’s a pronounced club edge to Deux, too. ‘Everybody’s Night’ is a true highlight of this record which flips between a fragile verse and discordant, death disco chorus. It’s worth considering this was recorded in 1985, and it sounds like it belongs in the sweaty, wild-eyed depths of a Ron Hardy marathon at Music Box. However, those freaky chorus-not-choruses drop with a ramshackle flair which inadvertently shows how much Pelletier and Tête were winging it whilst prefiguring motifs that sound like fully realised house and techno. It’s dreamy and deranged in an elegant way, but above all else Deux are full of guts and heart, and that’s why you should be paying attention now this particular curio has come back within reach.
OW
Kitty Grant – Glad To Know You’ (Discoring)
Kitty Grant’s effervescent cover of Chaz Jankel’s ‘Glad To Know You’ receives a welcome reissue, courtesy of immaculately curated Italian label, Discoring. Probably best-known as guitarist and keyboard player for Ian Dury & The Blockheads (who continue to perform as The Blockheads following Dury’s death in 2020), Jankel enjoyed a creditable solo career outside of the band. His 1981 track ‘Glad To Know You’ has long been revered as a favourite among Balearic-minded diggers, with 2012’s cover from Los Amigos Invisibles & Dimitri From Paris propelling the track into new millennium main rooms – thanks in no small part to Ray Mang’s epically extended remix.
Kitty’s 1983 cover version arrived as part of her Japan-only released second (and final) LP, ‘! D.a.s.h’, with three of the six tracks on the album produced by Jankel himself. Her previous album ‘Woman In Between’ spawned a pair of sugar-coated and city pop-themed singles, but ‘Glad To Know You’ is undoubtedly the song for which her short music career is best remembered. Unsurprisingly considering Jankel produced it, Kitty’s version sounds rather similar to the original – with stirring chord stabs bouncing over a rolling bass as organ solos glide across the splashing disco drums – perhaps the most notable difference being the bittersweet fragility Kitty’s vocal performance brings to the whimsical lyrics. There’s no mistaking the club credentials of the track, and the extended version included here sounds every bit as fresh and effective as it ever did. Also included on the 12” is the single’s original b-side, ‘Stop Wasting You Time’, a pulsing invitation for a suitor to stop beating around the bush, as it were. Here, Jankel’s post-punk-meets-pop swagger provides the bed for Kitty’s assertive vocal, as funk bass, free-wheeling sax, and glistening synths powerfully support her playful call to action.
PC
Monophonik / Diastema – Cherry Picked (Reel Long Overdub)
Since we last reviewed one of their compilation albums, Brudenell Groove’s label offshoot Reel Long Overdub have come even further in quest to champion new music, slowly but confidently making it rain with new releases from local Leeds affiliates SAH, Kerouac and DJ Ojo.
For their first ever vinyl EP, the normally Wharf Chambers-bound party has crossed the pond to New Delhi and Naples, bringing two new talents, Monophonik and Diastema, together for a shared record. That cosmopolitan approach to sourcing bangers has paid off – this is a a five-track fusion of techno styles ranging from wonky to blissy, wringing even more newness from the well-wrought space between hardcore and breaks.
Mind-splurge vocal samples egg on a farting acid line on the opening analogic force ‘Tabalchi’. While nowehere near the EP’s standout track, it happily nestles itself amongst some of the best breakbeat 2022 has had to offer so far. However, we’re most enthralled by Monophonik’s second track, ‘Source Code’, which is happily indecisive in its straddling of gabber and drum n’ bass. Past the two-minute mark, the tune brings a whole new meaning to the word ‘timestretched’, with a ‘whoa’ vox spanning a happy 10-second buildup to breaks n’ reese catharsis.
Diastema’s offerings seamlessly carry the torch, standardizing the EP’s focus on robotic bleeps and whirrs. While older bleep n’ bass tended to sound crude – as though the tunes came from a pale, imitative retrofuture – the robotic writhings of ‘Dubquake’ have a real accelerationist sheen to them, releasing the style from its primitive form. Watch out for the hidden digital bonus ‘Voyager’, too; though still retaining the bassweight of the prior tracks, it’s a hidden melodic gem, settling the anxieties the first four tracks. If you’ve been pining for a kickstart to 2022 vis-a-vis breakbeat, this is it.
JIJ
Kyle Hall – The Phi EP (Forget The Clock)
Detroit maestro Kyle Hall rounds off an excellent 2021 with his final release of the year, presenting five typically engaging cuts spread neatly across ‘The Phi EP’. Hall has firmly established himself among the brightest motor city producers operating today. His most recent output – all of which has been presented by his Forget The Clock imprint – has offered an awful lot to admire, effortlessly combining cutting edge deep house refinement with a looseness of feel and an off-kilter funk that appears to arrive so naturally for the pinnacle of his home-town creators. Here, opening track ‘Step Up’ swoops in with archetypal deep house shuffle, as atmospheric chords swirl and undulate around twinkling piano keys, retro vocal chops, and hypnotic bass notes.
Next, the dubbed-out grooves of ‘One 2 One Deep’ intoxicate as they repeat, with crisp beats and deeply-rooted bass permeating through the synth-heavy fog to add focus to the dance-heavy rhythm. The mystical harmonies of ‘Pico’ swell over trance-inducing percussion, before we arrive in the startling rhythms of ‘Carasee’. Here, seductive chords power the groove over jagged drums before mutant synths intertwine and unwind to send the cut into a machine-funk fervour. Finally, the unrestrained flex of ‘Quake’ end proceedings on an intergalactic high, as rolling bass and purposeful drums drive the groove through endless waves of delicately eccentric synth refrains before a mighty p-funk propels the music into an adjacent solar system.
PC
Cho & Random Impetus – Ray Mang Remixes (Gouranga Music)
London-based label Gouranga Music have been busily forging a fine reputation as high-quality purveyors of the various shades of contemporary disco since launching back in 2019. They’ve presented alluring titles from the likes of Ichisan, James Rod, and Dombrance via the various digital file formats, gaining plenty of admirers along the way. Here, they make their first exciting leap into the glorious vinyl realm with a set of remixes of ‘Brother Sister/Candle Lights’ by New York-based multi-piece band, Cho & Random Impetus. To mark their debut manifestation into the physical form, the label called upon the ever-so safe set of hands of Ray Mang to provide the reworks.
As usual, he goes above and beyond, coming correct with a selection of versions that are sure to tick the boxes of the most demanding of disco-leaning jocks and collectors. Released in 2019 on one-off label SHSF Records, the original versions elegantly fused contemporary-tinged soul, funk, and disco threads woven into an enjoyable – and now thoroughly collectable – 7” package. Staying true to the essence of the source material, disco maverick Ray Mang utilises his untouchable production prowess to embellish the tracks with a few measures of added boogie bite. Kicking things off, his vocal remix of ‘Brother Sister’ spaces out the arrangement, extracting the sing-along power of the vocals while beefing up the drums and adding a mightily growling synth bass to transform the cut into a main room powerhouse. Quite possibly even better, his trademark dub version almost entirely dispenses with the vocals to allow room for bass solos, gigantic timpani rolls, and tripped-out delays to soar across the dancefloors, morphing the track into a deviant space-disco masterpiece. On the flip, his extended version of ‘Candlelight’ gently rounds the loose-limbed soul flex of the original, while his instrumental version lets the carefully orchestrated instrumentation breathe, as soothing chords, plucked guitars, and rousing horns cascade over the silky smooth arrangement.
PC
The Deacon – Funky Revolutions (Rawak Motor City)
Underground Resistance’s Gerald Mitchell has always been active, but the same can’t be said for his side alias, The Deacon. Despite its relative lack of profile, though, this little side stint is responsible for some of the most killer tunes the OG techno collective ever had to offer. Under the name, Mitchell joined Mad Mike on the ‘Attack Of The Sonic Samurai’ EP in 2006, and made ‘Fuji’, a track that brought techno to new experimental, cinematic heights, charting beautiful far-eastern buildups and wuxia-frilled chord sweeps.
Later contributions to the fore included the funk-soaked single ‘Soulsaver’ and the nigh-illegal madhouse womper ‘Multi-Dimensional Drama’ – tunes which, according to lore, rendered Mitchell an ‘interstellar fugitive’ in the judging eyes of wider capitalism, banishing him and a host of other names to dormancy. Now, with the announcement of Mitchell’s newest EP under the name – ‘Funky Revolutions’ – it’s been revealed that Mitchell has survived exile, having remained in his meditative state at the top of Mt. Fuji for a good decade and a half. Apparently, among his crimes were “faith and sonic soul saving” and “using the Holy Ghost as the weapon of choice”.
‘Funky Revolutions’ itself hears the wonderful aftermath of Mitchell’s criminal past, sounding rather like the sonic equivalent of subdued radioactive detritus, resting on the barren ground after having survived the zap of The Deacon’s megablaster. The four cuts are dry, minimal and rough, proving an unmatched production aptitude that Mitchell, clearly, has still got. ‘Essence Of Bass’ is one sch example, using Drexciyan bass womps to convey a looming mood rivalling the sound of deep-sea sonar. The title track is so bassy that it distorts our puny headphones while still remaining enjoyable, while the speed-garage swing of ‘In Traffic’ nails a patient feel between rash chord stabs and gated claps. ‘Funky Revolutions’ is the return of a musical superhero we thought might never appear again – Mitchell might just be the prophesied ‘chosen one’ to save Detroit from pestilence.
JIJ
Lord Tang – Prolonged Sustained (Meakusma)
Quite what Dominic Cramp is up to is hard to discern. His work as Lord Tang has a slippery quality which evades clear comprehension. It’s not obtusely avant garde, but rather slops and slides with a downhome disarray which makes it easy to like even as it confounds you. Cramp has been skulking around the Bay Area doing leftfield dealings since the mid 90s, and you might well imagine his music jamming in the same vibrational hum as Afrikan Sciences, Carlos Niño and Sun Araw, without actually sounding like any of those mad cats. His previous album for Meakusma, Butterflies, was heavy on the palate, but brimming with invention and joyous expression. It had the structural integrity of a shanty town teetering on collapse but daubed in the most brilliant paint.
Where a full album of Tang felt like a delightfully discombobulating affair, it’s easier to get a handle on three tracks pressed in isolation. Cramp’s dubwise tendencies come through on ‘Clip Clop’, which sports the same lo-fi dub-not-dub vibe you might expect from Tapes. There’s plenty of dissonant melodic wrangling going on to keep things from getting too predictable, and there’s still a stubborn refusal to follow a particular structure, but the system created on the track feels fully rendered and discernible, striking an ideal balance between weird and accessible. Elsewhere, things become more obfuscated as ‘Stamps’ fumbles its cloudy fingers through stop-start beatdowns and hiccups of vocal without losing that sun-baked West Coast charm.
Maintaining that oddball dub sentiment on the B-side, German maverick Zonedog (better known as disrupt) pops up to offer a version of ‘Mountains and Streams’ which traverses a fluid but more roundly rendered river of sound. It’s caked in tape muck, and certainly not conventional by any stretch, but it stays on course and maintains an inherent warmth and playful spirit. Experimental outlier Weird Dust – previously spotted on labels like Crevette and Kerm – digs into the percussive qualities of ‘Clip Clop’ and shuffles them through a mound of ash, ensuring your aural receptors are feeling comfortably woolly as the needle slides into the runout groove.
OW
Lars Bartkuhn – Transcend (Rush Hour)
You have to take your hats off to the Rush Hour crew, with the Amsterdam-based label continuing to keep subterranean dancers on their toes with an imaginative blend of inventive deep house and techno and internationally-focused rhythms. Their fingers are, as ever, well and truly on the pulse of the dance zeitgeist, and all of their output is – at the very least – worthy of taking the time to digest. Arriving here for the first time on the label is super-talented producer and Needs Music co-founder, Lars Bartkuhn.
With an expansive and musically-rich sound that’s exquisitely hard to predict or pin down, Bartkuhn has released universally dazzling music as a solo artist on labels including Neroli and Sonar Kollektiv, as well as alongside his brother Marek and Yannick Elverfeld under the Needs banner. Title-track ‘Transcend’ incorporates many of the characteristics we’ve come to admire from the Frankfurt-based artist, with a glorious meta-house aesthetic that’s simultaneously organic and precise. Captivating chords power over cascading rhythms as free-spirited parts interplay, joyously galloping across the panorama before the track builds to an acoustic-guitar led and mystically-charmed crescendo. On the reverse, the gentle rhythms of ‘Every Morning I Meditate’ dance across layers of soul-soothing harmonic waves, blissfully combining to evoke the healing power of a midsummer Mediterranean sunrise.
PC
Medici Daughter – Medici Daughter (Eel)
Medici Daughter is an anonymous solo project from Falmouth’s Eel label, and can best be described as ‘deconstructed emo breakcore’. Working in a style made largely by US, Belgian and Swedish artists (Sewerslvt springs to mind), we can be sure it’ll be well-received in the UK, having not yet received full representation by English artists.
Not much is known about Medici Daughter, but we can be sure whoever’s behind the project has a killer taste for art direction, with each new single accompanied by a rich palette of edgy weeaboo characters and jagged designs against loud backgrounds. ‘PVL Toxin’ itself is abrasive and hurt, and might well be describable as one of the first real fusions of breakcore and digicore emo. Filled to the brim with bitcrushed surround-sound design and machine-fire amens – automatively reeling off at different speeds – first listens might not reveal this to be anything more than an IDM bit from back in the day. However, we’re soon taken aback at the sudden breakdown into distant emo vocals at the 1-minute mark, which are in turn backed up by arpeggiated droplet synths, like a much needed shower from the prior minute’s muddy crunch. The track’s climax towards the end goes full-on e-Squarepusher; for anyone after a cathartic neural scramble hydraulic-pressed into the space of three minutes, Medici has you sorted.
JIJ
This week’s reviewers: Jude Iago James. Oli Warwick, Patrizio Cavaliere.