The best new singles this week
All the plastic that’s fantastic right now
SINGLE OF THE WEEK
Theo Parrish – Weirdo (Sound Signature)
It’s always a good day when fresh material from Theo Parrish hits the shelves, and this is most certainly the case as we welcome the arrival of his latest Sound Signature expedition, ‘Weirdo’. Even set against the work of the most talented of his Detroit peers – and there are more than a few of those – Theo’s music is unique, uncompromising, engaging, and improbably good. Offering flashes of jazz, soul, funk and raw, analogue dirt, the firebrand producer constantly pushes the envelope with his evolving and intuitive sound. Having been deep in the game for the best part of three decades, it goes without saying that his output renders him entirely deserving of his folkloric position in the motor city corps d’elite.
With spoken word vocals unfurling over scattered drums, grainy pads and freeform bass, the portent mood of ‘Weirdo’ is enlivened with jazzy keys and loose handclaps to create a mesmerising stereo meditation. Next, rhythm takes centre stage as the music is stripped to its barest components on ‘Original Weirdo’, with fizzing snares, handclaps and toms propelling the fierily personal monologue. Finally, and arguably best of all, ‘Imaginary Thugfunk’ sees Parrish flex like only Parrish can, with meandering keys echoing over crunching drums and walking bass for a bewildering, heads-down strut.
PC
NAD – The Electro EP (Rush Hour)
It truly is a case of ‘less is more’ for the maestro behind Rush Hour Records’ latest offering. Here, Amsterdam’s finest present the latest in a long line of intriguing releases, welcoming back mysterious producer NAD with (the descriptively titled) ‘The Electro EP’. Though NAD’s release catalogue is far from extensive, his sparsely populated archive is exceptionally high grade and, interestingly, stretches back a good deal further than most electronic producers still in action today. His debut arrived over 30 years ago in the form of the achingly atmospheric, Detroit-esque double-header ‘Distant Drums/Sphere’.
The full album ‘Dawn Of A New Age’ arrived a year later, but it was a cool 27 years before we heard from him again, when Rush Hour welcomed him to the fold with the ‘New Aural Discourse’ comeback EP. This time, we’ve only had to wait five years for a follow-up, so we can count ourselves extremely lucky that the man behind the music – Mustafa Ali – has found time to work his audio magic in the lab. Summoning bass-heavy influences from LA, Miami, and the UK alongside astrally charged deep techno, the four-track EP brilliantly maintains the immaculately high-quality threshold Ali sets with his releases.
First up, the Dune-inspired ‘Cometh The Butlerian Jihad’ launches over fizzing electro drums as butt-shaking bass and spacey synth sweeps effortlessly intertwine. Next, UK flavours about in the scattered drums and dainty arpeggios of ‘Machine In The Ghost’, with its thick sub-bass and deviant synth stabs supporting the harmonic vocoder lead to dramatic effect. Turning to the B side, ‘Utopia Dystopia’ hits hard with its jerking Miami rhythm, with funk-coated synth bass and maniacal bleeps powering the groove into the farthest intergalactic reaches. Finally, the brooding funk continues into ‘Pax’, with gated pads and swirling hats gyrating over full-bodied bass, driving snares and whispered robot vocals. The hope is that we don’t have to wait too many years for more material from NAD, but if we do, ‘The Electro EP’ should do a grand job keeping us entertained until the next instalment arrives.
PC
Pieter Kock – Facial Recognition (R i O)
Deep in Berlin’s underbelly, you’ll find O Tannenbaum, a tiny hidey-hole bar in Neukölln. The best things come in small packages; this bar – which otherwise serves Belgian beer and hosts homemade hummus competitions – also happens to be one of the city’s most eminent proponents of avant-garde electronic music. Most nights play host to a range of DJs and live acts, specialising in vanguard electro-crossover genres: no wave, punk, cosmic, pop and jazz.
Building on years of involvement with its management – and occupying many hours behind its DJ decks – Pieter Kock now releases a new solo mini-album, decades on from his involvement with seminal underground bands and strange former aliases (The Hitmachine, Taladu, etc.). Given the whirlwind of inspiration surrounding O Tennenbaum, we’re not surprised at the depth of concept behind this mini-LP. ‘Facial Recognition’ is a hauntologic take on the future implications of AI, reconciling the future-shock of facial imaging with retrofuturist cornerstones: library music, tape, muzak, funk, fuzz.
Over just seven tracks, Kock portrays an alternative idea of the Internet, where cyberspace isn’t portrayed in bursts of digital electric noise, but rather its earlier analogues. Opener ‘Fairlight’ is named after the first commercial sampler, and makes use of a similar sound to the ring-modulated, magnetic tape generated ‘bubble’ sound used in the first ever electronic soundtrack, Forbidden Planet. After that, though, the intertext to old media becomes less obvious. ‘It’s Raining Toothpicks’ contains a sound that resembles a slowed-down mbira, resting in a bed of discordance portraying the digilog as a world of sensuous wonder. ‘Unchain Your Dub’ side-eyes the eminent dub label Chain Reaction with an underwater exercise in dub, its snares completely cut off, as though they’re submerged in the impossible neural backend of a quantum computer.
It keeps going; ‘Caroline Your Cart Has Changed’ sounds like something between a DJ Rashad track and the beatgridded rattling of a spray can, while ‘We Take Them To Court’ ends the album on a dubious note of daytime-TV sample loopage and space-age chordwork. Kock’s sound is a tactile experience, with its pastiche of library music seeming to spell doom for the digital age.
JIJ
Future Jazz Ensemble – Rough Time EP (Ten Lovers Music)
As Nasty Boy, Nicola Penna has built up a low key profile in contemporary deep house which speaks to the roots of the genre without sounding throwback. The most recent Nasty Boy EP on Puu spoke to scuffed machine rhythms shot through with a subdued jazziness and plenty of lysergic FX tweaking, but it was still house music in a pure sense. On this emergent project, which debuted with some self-released records in 2020, Penna is exploring a more organic sound which still bears the hallmarks of his sparkling synthesis.
Future Jazz Ensemble sounds like a jazz patchwork in the way Healing Force Project does, capturing the band impulse of traditional jazz and filtering it through the psychedelic potential of electronic music culture without losing the improvisational magic. If the first two releases took swerves into edgy dissonance, this new 12” for Ten Lovers has a smoother finish. ‘Mystic Blends’ bathes in warm Rhodes licks and ‘Rough Time’ carries muted trumpet flutters and loping double bass, but it still shivers with edgy programming. ‘That Feeling’ and ‘Pathways’ work with dissonance more explicitly, while the drums skitter across the soundfield without losing hold of the groove. It all winds up as another fresh missive from Penna’s considerable output, nailing an angle on modern jazz abstraction which is satisfying and stimulating in equal measure.
OW
Alexander Robotnick – The Hidden Game (Bosconi Records)
Sound Virus – Waveforms (Bosconi Records)
Operating out of the rolling Tuscan hills, Bosconi remains one of the driving forces in Italian house and techno with a deep and meandering catalogue which prizes musicality and flair over cookie cutter functionality. After a quiet year since the last release from Cixxx J, the label returns with a double drop which neatly sums up the Bosconi ethos. On one hand you have a new solo EP from a veritable legend of Italian electronic music, Alexander Robotnick. For The Hidden Game he makes a rare break from releasing on his own Hot Elephant. Meanwhile, Sound Virus are an obscure UK tech house project from the mid 90s dug out from retirement with a clutch of tracks pulled from hidden DAT tapes, nodding to Bosconi’s affinity for rekindling the profile of cult producers like 100Hz and Gari Romalis.
Robotnick’s sound is strident and punchy on The Hidden Game, packed full of the staccato drums and thrumming, fulsome synth hooks that have made him a dancefloor powerhouse since the early 80s. The title track in particular has a ghoulish charm with its dark melodic arrangement, which gets a tasteful revision from another Italian stalwart, Marco Passarani, on the flip. Holding true to the Italo disco DNA of the original, Passarani teases out big room histrionics without losing that cool bite which always made Robotnick’s tracks more universal than some of the more divisive Italo. It’s just the right amount of camp and slamming, joining the dots for different generations of Italian club music heritage in beautiful fashion.
Sound Virus’ two versions of ‘Wavey’ speak to the golden age of deep UK techno with a sound which accidentally pairs perfectly with Robotnick’s own voluptuous monosynth lines. The rubbery acid lines pulsing underneath the ‘Intro Mix’ especially nod to Italo albeit within the context of immersive, hypnagogic techno which hides its age remarkably well. ‘Inter (#3 Mix)’ speaks more explicitly to the 90s with its more direct, very subtly trancey throb, but things get more interesting on ‘Matte (#7 Mix)’ which locks into a swung groove that would sit very comfortably alongside the likes of 100Hz and that early wave of tech house.
While their context might be very different, these two records make for very natural bedfellows, championing the kind of club music which prioritises melody and groove, but never at the expense of subtlety. It’s a style which Bosconi remains flawless at delivering, wherever they look for their source material.
OW
TVSI/Loraine James – 053 (AD 93)
The percussive force of both TVSI and Loraine James’ sounds are relentless. But together in collaboration, they’ve found a place of peace. Helming new, broken strands of experimental techno in recent years – with James’ going for live, button-mashed ambient rhythmscapes, and TSVI drawing on loud, tribal drumming – their new EP on AD93 hears a middle ground between the two. It comes after a heads-down spate of collaboration in various Hackney studios, with this EP emerging after a post-COVID gestation period.
This is meditative music, the electronic equivalent of omming through lockdown miasma. Restless urges and niggling thoughts pass vis a vis drum glitches, while our prefrontal cortexes hover on a cloud of padded, washy, harmonic synths. ‘Gloom’ begins as a complete and utter piano blissout emergent into a frenetic soundscape. The track shifts rapidly between soft sound-floating, and sharp arousal. Amens rattle in and out of time-step, dilating any normal sense of rhythmic completion. The trend continues on ‘Awaiting’, which titularly gets at that same sense of intractable restlessness we feel while held down, locked in. Less techno and more ambient, it even has a liturgic voice, which sings and stutters, devoted to a cause put on hold.
‘Eternal’ is a paradoxically fleeting track, with deep distorted drum hits bedding free-moving retrosynths, fittingly recalling those used by the late Vangelis in his soundtracks. The rug is pulled out from underneath us at the halfway mark, where radiostatic bass takes over and juke rattlings overtake. By the end of the EP, rounded off by the climax ‘Observe’ (which involves fantastic use of vocaloid harmonies) and the pianized return to baseline ‘Trust’, we realise James and TSVI have perfected a very specific style. The sensibility is raw emotion and naive breakwork – by no means is the music here neurotic or grating, despite its subtle maximalism. This is music for an actualized mind, one which watches but refuses to deny chaos.
JIJ
Gaoule Mizik – Excursions In Gwoka Vol 1 (Beauty & The Beat)
There’s been an abundance of great music from Guadaloupe being explored and presented for Western audiences in recent times. In particular, the wonderful Lespri Ka compilation on Time Capsule took a considered, beautifully presented dive into the island’s Gwoka music between 1981 and 2010. Time Capsule is a reissue label born out of the community around Beauty & The Beat, one of the finest diggers get downs in London town, and now the mothership is turning its attention to Gwoka music with this beautiful record.
As the label themselves explain, Gaoulé Mizik is a Gwoka outfit who recorded two albums in the late 80s, and the lead track on this 12” ‘A Ka Titine’ has been favourite from Beauty & The Beat parties for some time. It’s not hard to understand why, between the insistent but oh-so delicate roll of the percussion to Michel Laurent’s flawless voice up front, telling a story reportedly about going to a beach hut to eat fish and drink rum before getting into a fight. There’s a spicier twist to ‘Kan Sizé Sonné’, which gets a remix treatment from Beauty alumnus CW, while Kay Suzuki creates a Gwoka Dub of ‘A Ka Titine’ which keeps the spiritual tradition of the music at the forefront while teasing out even more dancefloor potency.
There’s a pervading sensitivity around the way the label and remixers approach the material, celebrating its eternal, universal danceability without trashing its cultural context. It’s a rare delight, presented with care for people to savour and express joy to, far beyond the island it came from.
OW
Alex Kassian – Strings Of Eden (Pinchy & Friends)
Alex Kassian returns to Pinchy & Friends with his latest Balearic sojourn, deep diving on the entirely blissful ‘Strings OF Eden’ EP. The 12” follows last year’s sundown anthem ‘Leave Your Life’, and finds the Berlin-based producer in gorgeously seductive form. Kassian’s classy compositions have found loving homes on labels including Love On The Rocks and Utopia, while collaborative material manifested alongside Hiroaki OBA as Opal Sunn have graced the roster at Touch A Distance as well as on the Planet Sundae imprint Kassian co-runs. With a hard to pigeon-hole aesthetic that elegantly glides between propulsive techno, dreamy deep house, and immersive ambient, it’s easy to understand why he continues to win fans from all corners of the electronic underground.
If the vocal line of ‘Leave Your Life’ provided the irresistible hook, here it’s sumptuous synth melodies and sun-kissed string harmonies armed to lure in the listener. The kick drum is jettisoned to allow glistening percussion to keep the tempo, providing maximum space for the heartfelt instrumentation to magically unfold. Piano keys twinkle across waves of string textures as profound synth solos hover across the skyline, joined by smokey saxophone swirls as dainty congas elevate the groove. Honeyed but tinged with melancholy, this is genuinely beautiful work from Kassian, lending itself supremely well to the Miguel Atwood-Ferguson mix that follows.
The rhythm is implied on the cinematic ‘Garden Mix’ as the LA-based composer classically reframes the parts, with elegant harp strums appearing from the shadows as the full glory of the instrumentation is dramatically exposed. Finally, ‘Passing Clouds’ continues the soundtrack theme, with delicate textures combining with powerful drones as gentle waves splash onto temperate shores. Genuinely sublime work here as Kassian threatens to move beyond the underground confines into expansive compositional realms.
PC
V.I.V.E.K – Colours EP (V.I.V.E.K)
When he dropped the Different Sound / Galactic 12” in 2019 on a new self-titled label, Vivek Sharda was pointing to a progression in his music. Sharda has kept the 140 flag flying even as many of his peers have moved on to different areas of investigation, and yet he’s never seemingly lacked inspiration. Alongside the likes of Commodo, he’s continually pushed inventive twists on the dubstep template without losing the essence of the sound, both with his own releases and those on his shockingly consistent System label. This self-titled label implies a more personal approach which takes another step on with this follow-up four-tracker.
Sharda is still committed to the foundations of dubstep, but it’s clear from the get-go that Colours EP is a vessel for expression beyond the bruising functionality of a pure club record. ‘Colours’ is instantly warm and engaging, splashed with flurries of sax and daubed in fuzzy chord tones which call to mind the melodious slant Martyn brought to dubstep when he started his 3024 label. There’s still ample subs and artfully angled beats to get a mass of bodies moving, but the sax especially takes the lead here, celebrating musicality instead of muscle.
‘Take Me Away’ pushes further away from the dance, revelling in atmospheric sound design across a concise run time. There are still pointed bass pulses and snatches of percussion, but they’re bit parts in a broader story shaped out by noirish piano drops and anchorless dub tech swoops. ‘Sign Of The Times’ nods its head a little closer to the stack with the EP’s most dance-oriented cut, but never at the expense of the delicacy which defines this branch of the V.I.V.E.K sound. ‘Roller’ meanwhile has a certain functionality in its minimalism, but again the intention feels slanted towards mood rather than a show of force. There are low end swells and a steady-tracking shuffle, but the off-key snatches reach for something more avant garde than you necessarily intend when trying to shock out the dance.
Giving himself some space to stretch out is clearly working wonders for one of dubstep’s truest disciples. Sharda’s not shirked his trajectory as an artist by any means, but rather expanded on who V.I.V.E.K is and what we can expect from him in the future.
OW
Braque De Weimar – Folie Douce (Cracki)
France’s Cracki Records put out a range of partystarting music both new and old. This month they’ve bucked the trend, not settling on either extreme, rereleasing a relatively new but also kind of old EP from Braque De Weimar. The French crate-digger and solo producer released this EP all the way back in 2020, piggybacking off the eponymous single, which came out a further two years earlier in 2018. Now we finally get a vinyl version with 3 new original extras in tow.
Cutting a free-spirited image, Braque De Weimar brings a canine spirit to his brand of hip house, which he both produces himself and raps on. ‘Folie Douce’ works in an older house sound but has everything; an infectious backbeat works around nonsense lyrics touching on themes of bacchanalia, crime and dreaming (“tender madness, hard drugs… gratuitous violence… In my spare time doubt invites itself”).
The A tunes, meanwhile, are tenderer, focusing on phased disco-funk sounds. Both ‘Une Eternite’ and ‘L’Embellie’ hear Weimar’s similarly sated voice glide over slapping instrumentals, flanged like music for telepathic comedowns. And in a curveball burst of creativity, the fourth track ‘Tristest’ wallops us round the unexpected bend; it’s a completely unforeseeable French drill instrumental, with choral vocals trilling grittily and ominously. Evidently, Weimar’s music captures the spirit of modern, multicultural Paris, split between electronic dance, funk and rap – versatile is the word.
JIJ
Mali Larrington-Nelson’s music has trickled out over the past 10 years in snatches of digital releases for DVA Music, Rhythm Section and Diskotopia amongst others. In the mean time she’s forged her reputation through a strong DJ presence on NTS and elsewhere, throwing down a loose style that joins the dots between grime, techno, broken beat, house and well, just about everything with an inherent funk.
In the first of a mooted series of drops for Eglo, she looks set to solidify her trajectory as an artist with an assured three-track 12” which sounds right at home on Alexander Nut’s peerless label. The range is as broad as existing fans of her sound would expect, leading in with the twitchy, noise caked techno of ‘IP Addy’, where the synth lines red line in a style that calls to mind Shake at his rowdiest. ‘Crumb Trail’ has a housier bent, but it’s also laced with acid and artfully squashed in the rhythm section. ‘A New Way Of Looking At An Old Place’ smooths things out, but not at the expense of the scuffed vibe which presents itself as Shy One’s calling card on this vital, idiosyncratic release.
OW
AOW – Hear The Light (Circus Company)
Lisbon-based creators Dan Ghenacia and Tolga Fidan usher in their new AOW project following a period of deeply immersed studio experimentation, resurfacing with the intriguing ‘Hear The Light EP’. Long time friends and European house and techno stalwarts, the pair began working together in 2020 while sharing working space at the creative hub of Boa Lab in the Portuguese capital. Surrounded by musicians, designers and engineers, Ghenacia had been busily experimenting with alpha wave generation inspired by Bryon Gysin’s Dream Machine – having developed a contemporary update on Gysin’s design alongside engineer, Anine Kirsten. Inspired by in-depth experimentation on the hallucinatory effects and therapeutic properties of projecting alpha waves onto a subject’s eyelids, the AOW project sees the duo travel far beyond the four-to-the-floor sonic stamp for which they’re each best known.
Traversing spacious soundscapes and expansive audio textures, the EP reimagines familiar influences of UK electronica and Bay Area breaks through a modernist lens, serving a striking three-track collection that roams far beyond nightclub confines. Journeying through the rolling breaks and euphoric pads of opening track ‘Boa’ to the wobbly synths of electro-themed ‘Red Alert’ and on into the wiggy introspection of closing cut ‘Organico’, this is impressive work from the newly-formed collaboration. While the tone of the music may come as something of a surprise to fans of the pair’s back catalogue, the quality of the production most certainly will not. Highly recommended.
PC
This week’s reviewers: Jude Iago James, Oli Warwick. Patrizio Cavaliere