Saturday 31 July 2010

Feature: Statement from Chris Liebing on the tragic deaths at Love Parade

Just in from Chris Liebing - his statement on the tragic events at Germany's infamous Love Parade.

"5 days after the tragic events at the Love Parade in Duisburg / Germany, I would like to share my thoughts in a more detailed statement. First of all I want to again express my sincere compassion for all the relatives and friends of the victims, as well as for the injured and traumatized who will have hard times to recover from what they experienced. I am still shocked about what I have seen and heard so far.

"The Love Parade has been developing throughout the 90s, parallel to what I would call the “Techno Movement”. More precisely speaking, the Love Parade has been an expression of this movement. It has been a movement beyond any profit or image seeking ideas, which developed completely self-sufficient out of the underground. It was all about celebrating, dancing and having fun together.

"Over the years, the numbers of attendants have been rising, and so have the financial needs. The costs were rising (city cleaning, etc.) and so has the profit (for the community and the others involved), and suddenly there was a certain “image” attached, which brands could use to increase their value.

"Looking back, it is actually a logical consequence and maybe also easy to recognize, that an event like this would eventually fall into the hands of people who see “celebrating, dancing and having fun together”  not as the main reason to host a Love Parade. This would actually still be tolerable, as long as human life would not be endangered, but what happened here is beyond anything one would have ever imagined.

"It is absolutely appalling and shocking that the responsible organizers of the Love Parade and the city council in Duisburg have misused the “Techno Movement” with those fatal results. In their striving for image and profit, they have disregarded all measures of control and security and put people who really just wanted to celebrate, dance and have fun together in a situation in which 21 innocent persons had to die and countless have been injured and traumatized.

"I hope that it will be possible to entirely clear up what has happened and that the guilty persons will be held responsible and punished as soon as possible. But even this will not lessen the caused pain.

"The least we owe to those who have died and those who got injured, is that we make sure that something like this won´t happen again in the future. New laws and rules won´t really help. We have seen that we can´t even trust those who should make sure that those rules are getting observed. 

"To really change something, we have to start with ourselves. We as DJs, we have to be even more sure about the “Who” we are playing for and the “Where” we are playing at – only like this, the fans can get a better orientation of where it is worth going and where it is save to celebrate. Basically everybody can change a lot with his or her behaviour in this world. The more alert we go through life, the more conscious we can make choices between good and bad products, services, events or other things. Like this we minimize the scope of action for cold-blooded profiteers.

In memory of the victims of the Love Parade in Duisburg 2010."

Chris Liebing

Wednesday 28 July 2010

July 2010 (Week 4) Clubbing Listings: Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Dundee

Edinburgh

Club: It's All Good
Venue: Cabaret Voltaire
Date: 30th July


It’s an It’s All Good Residents’ Party this week, with all shades of house (funky, hard, groovy, electro and here) and brand new residents on rotation, Niall Angus and Craig Wilson. Tommy Kay, Claudio, Tonykeo, Stuart Kane, Gregsta and Niall will tear up the Cab Vol’s Speakeasy, and discounted table deals are available in advance from its-all-good@live.co.uk.

11pm-3am, £ 5

Club: Sahara Sessions
Venue: Po Na Na
Date: 30th July


On the same night as It’s All Good is another house contender; the launch night of Sahara Sessions at student-friendly Po Na Na, aiming to “bring fun, glam and sexy clubbing back to Edinburgh”. Again, that probably means I’m not invited until I pick up the glam and sexy side of things, but if you’re diggin’ the funky, disco-sparring house rhythms of labels such as Defected or Hed Kandi join John Hutchison as he spins the vinyl biscuits.

10.30pm–3am, £7 / £4 before 11pm


Club: Jackhammer
Venue: The Caves
Date: 30th July


As you can tell from the name, expect nothing but cuddly, fluffy, sweetie beats – what more can you expect from the head of Tortured Records? Actually scratch that, Jackhammer likes to mess your head up and rub your ear drums up and down the stone walls with techno ferocity, so good thing they’ve got Billy Nasty! The Stepback DJs and Gee Dubs support.

10.30pm-3am, £7 / £5

Club: Cause It
Venue: The GRV
Date: 31st July

 

A charity night in support of St Columba's Hospice, Cause It welcomes Canadian techno purveyor Patrick DSP (Blackout Audio) alongside residents from JakN and Jungledub; F-N, Sekonz, Brother Most Righteous, Tamobanter, and Tekamine. Party to techno and feel the charitable vibes!

10pm-3am, £6

Club: Big 'N' Bashy
Venue: The Bongo Club
Date: 31st July

 

Rinse FM DJs Elijah and Skilliam play an intimate gathering of dubstep, reggae and bassy charms for the Big 'N' Bashy crew. Also faithfully taking on DJ duties are Taz Buckfaster (Subway), Deburgh and Decoy Roy; no, you don't need to wipe your feet, that grime is supposed to be there! Check Eliah and Skilliam's recent podcast here - go on, click it, you know you want to.

11pm-3am, £7

Glasgow

Featured Event of the Week: Electric Frog Street Carnival
Venue: SWG3
Date: 1st August


Ah, I like the idea of a mini-festival; one which requires no flippin’ tent or having to buy in ‘sensible’ shoes. No, I like my fests on concrete with flushing toilet access and short bar queues. If you’re of similar mind set check out the electro line-up occurring inside and outside, across three stages, under the influence of five bars and a food court chucked in to make sure you can top up what you sweat off.

In the Optimo (Espacio) Marquee: Liquid Liquid, Simian Mobile Disco, Alter Ego, Optimo and Factory Floor.

In the Sensu Room: Felix da Housecat, Luke Slater presents Planetary Assault Systems live, Cottam and of course the Sensu crew, live.

The Street Party brings on: Trus’me, Simon Cordiner & Billy Woods, Teamy & Dirty Larry (Wrong Island), Dema & Nice (Freakmenouvers), and Craig Moogroove & Kev Stevens.

It’s a veritable mix of local acts, cherished global hits, and more electronic music crammed onto warehouse land beside the Clyde than should be possible. Techno, house, electro, disco, punk, bass and plenty screams of ‘wan more tune’.

2pm-11pm, £32+bf / £29+bf early bird

Aberdeen

Club: Ironworks Summer Party
Venue: The Ironworks, Inverness
Date: 31st July


The Ironworks venue is hosting a summer party with special guests Les Petits Pilous from Boys Noize Records (rescheduled from June). Anthony Ferrando and Jean-Patrick Simonetti dish out thrashing electronica like a repeated kick to the head by a gang of mean-street synths. 

10pm-late, £7 adv.

Wednesday 21 July 2010

July 2010 (Week 4) Clubbing Listings: Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Dundee

Edinburgh

Featured Club of the Week: Departure Lounge
Venue: The Caves
Date: 23rd July


Lucky number 7! Departure Lounge finally reach that itchy milestone and to celebrate they're hosting two events within two weeks of each other at Edinburgh's venerable Caves venue. For Part 1 the Edinburgh Samba School perform live, joined by the 10 piece dub-machine that is Captain Slackship's Mezzanine Allstars (live) and topped off with DJ sets from Astroboy, Jiminez and Mr Zimbabwe; stacking up the hip-hop, afrobeat, latin, dubstep, reggae, soul and more. This is as close to Brazil you can get without leaving the country!

This year alone Departure Lounge has had performances from Bonobo, Bass Clef, DJ Parker, Ordinary Allstars, Haggis Horns, and the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, the latter of which the DL crew have selected as their highlight of 2010 so far:



The line-up for the rest of the year is currently being shaped, with a Soundway Records Party this November, and performances from Floating Points and Fatima in October.

10pm-3am, £8 / £6 advance

More info: The second part of Departure Lounge's celebrations takes place on the 1st of August at the same venue as part of the Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival with live performances from The Bays, Hidden Orchestra (formerly the Joe Acheson Quartet) and Asthmatic Astronaut. 9pm-1am, £12.50 advance

Club: Wasted British Youth
Venue: The Caves
Date: 24th July


New event Wasted British Youth launches this month at The Caves (quickly becoming the 'de rigueur' venue in Edinburgh for large events) with a roster of electro, dirty and fidgit house, electro, big beat and disco. To kick off the club night WBY have DJ 101 who supported Carl Cox for three years in a row; Planisfear & Thundercat who are playing Belladrum Festival this summer; Alex Finlay, a regular on the Edinburgh DJ scene; Kai Davidson, co-founder of Cab Vol club, Axis; and Vinylkiller.

10pm-3am, £5

Club: Alternative
Venue: Cabaret Voltaire
Date: 24th July


Taking over the entire Voltaire Venue, Alternative bring together local club nights This is Sick and Dirt for a three room face-off of house, electro, dub, techno, ghetto, dubstep and plenty bass. Room 1 is hosted by Derrick Burns & Jose, Debauched, and Maestro DD & Cobi, while Room 2 holds the bassy Innuendub and Kris Wasabi Walker takes the Speakeasy with disco and funky chillin'.

11pm-3am, £6 / £4 before midnight

Glasgow


Club: Dirty Noise & Muck
Venue: Stereo
Date: 22nd July


The two clubs combine to bring the Weegies some Dutch madness aka Mightyfools, quoted to "smash your tits off" with electro-punk attitude; slipping in techno, rave and wonk. The Dirty Noise and Muck DJs Go-Dirty, PmcQ, Digital Stitch and Martin What? support with visuals from Joe Crogan in the form of a 'special kind of Big Tits Eagle... [which will] shoot lasers out of its tits'. Don't think you'll even need to drop acid for this one!

11pm-3am, £5

Extra: You can also catch Mightyfools (the first signings to Venga Digital) at Edinburgh's Axis at Cab Vol on 23rd July for house, techno, breaks and electro on two floors with DJ sets from Kai Davidson, Anarkid and Dickie Drysdale. Special guest Liam Vizzle, managing A&R for Venga Digital and putting out his own EP and monthly podcasts, brings more electro and techno. 11pm-3am, £5

Club: Rubadub
Venue: Sub Club
Date: 23rd July


Glasgow's Rubadub Records celebrate the store's 18th birthday and website relaunch with a special three-hour set from Jeff Mills, encapsulating Rubadub's long-lived love for techno, house and wider dance music. Numbers' Jackmaster supports - be sure to get down early if you've haven't bought tickets in advance - this one will be popular!

10pm-4am, £15

Club: Cosmic Microwave
Venue: The Admiral
Date: 24th July


Step inside the Cosmic Microwave for heated deep disco and house with special guest Dicky Trisco (founder of Deep Freeze Recordings / Disco Deviance) after his booking at Glasgow' Merchant City Festival was cancelled. Clinical and B*Licious are on support.

11pm-3am, £5


Aberdeen

Club: New Soul City Live
Venue: The Ironworks, Inverness
Date: 24th July


It's not often a former cult sci-fi comedy star comes to the Highlands for a funk and soul DJ set - my mouth dropped when I read and re-read that Craig Charles from Red Dwarf (third from the left) will be delivering the beats for a special one-off show. Check out Craig's 6Music Funk and Soul Show every Saturday, 6-9pm. Local funkateers The Leonard Jones Potential will provide live support.

10pm-late, £10

Monday 12 July 2010

July 2010 (Week 3) Clubbing Listings: Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Dundee

Right, I'm off to Amsterdam in a few hours so listings have been rather hurried - 'featured club of the week' will be back as of next week, and until then enjoy the torture, techno and trends that make up this weekend! I'm off to see the Poezenboot!



Edinburgh

Club: Compakt
Venue: Cabaret Voltaire
Date: 16th July


Dundee club Headway joins Compakt this month for a fusion of East and East electro, breaks, techno and dubstep; in room 1 Andy Barton, Graeme Binnie, Bruce Anderson and Neil Clarke take the reins, while room 2 is hosted DD, Az-Tech's Al Majik and more to be announced.

11pm-3am, £4 / £0 before midnight

Club: Devil Disco Club
Venue: Bongo Club
Date: 16th July


Kris Wasabi is back from his South American adventures in one DJing piece and will be back behind the decks at Devil Disco Club, also featuring live Edinburgh electro-pop act HRH. Hobbes, Erik d'Viking and Simonotron spin dark disco, acid, proto-house and italo, bringing Dante's Inferno to the Bongo Club.

11pm-3am, £5 / £3 before midnight

Club: Riddim Tuffa Sound
Venue: GRV
Date: 16th July


Edinburgh's homegrown Jamaican music DJ Robigan joins Riddim Tuffa Sound for their special guest slot - reggae it up, feel the jungle beats and leave room for dancehall and dubstep!

10.30pm-3am, £6 / £4 before midnight

Club: Messenger Sound System
Venue: Bongo Club
Date: 17th July


MC Ras Echo returns to Messenger Sound System for a double helping of reggae and roots in Edinburgh this weekend - sweet beats for the summer nights.

11pm-3am, £7 / £6 before midnight

Club: Torture Garden Summer Ball
Venue: The Caves
Date: 17th July


If clubbing choice is all a little too light for you, Torture Garden bring their Summer ball back to Edinburgh for a larger affair in the suitable caves. As well as the usual fetish, neo-burlesque and live art shows throughout the night (featuring some of the biggest names in British burlesque), there will be a clubbing ballroom with electro, breaks, dubstep, dnb, and house; the Kabarett Boudoir plays Vegas and Gypsy punk and Lava Lounge and Tiki Room get out the Glamour Trash, rockabilly, italo-disco and anything exotic. Remember this ain't a 'swing by' event - full dress expected - no fancy dress, no street wear, and no cotton t-shirts. Think latex, chains, leather and serious fantasy.

9pm-3am, £20 on the door (limited tix, get there early)

Club: Musika
Venue: The Liquid Room HMV Picture House
Date: 17th July


Like the proverbial phoenix, the Musika rises from the ashes of a curry-house fire, and relaunches with house and techno 'encore une fois' club stalwart, Sasha. The event was originally to coincide with the relaunch of the Liquid Room, but unfortunately they forgot to build a fire curtain into the roof and will need to postpone.

11pm-3am, £15


Glasgow

Club: Death Disco
Venue: The Arches
Date: 17th July


It's a Death Disco Resident's party, with Hush Puppy, Josh Jones, DJ Mingo-Go and Wavy Graves - you may notice the new additions to the roster Jones and Graves. Josh Jones brings the spaced-out element to disco and wraps it in an Italo cosmos and hip-hop daubs. Wavy Graves are Josh Hill and Vickie McDonald take an exploratory turn, excavating crunk, skwee, post-punk, and disco with a wonk.

11pm-3am, £12 / £7 discount pass available from deathdisco.info

Club: Tictactoe
Venue: The Ferry
Date: 16th July

There ain't no games at Tictactoe's first birthday when Seth Troxler gets behind the decks; the Michigan-born Detroit DJ turned Berlinner ramps up the house and techno. Dig out his Boogybyte's mix and start flexing those dance muscles.

11pm-3am, £12

Club: Cotton Cake vs Thunder Disco Club
Venue: Sub Club
Date: 16th July

Thunder Disco Club and Cotton Cake join forces to shake up electronic music and induce rhythmic shaking to italo-disco, funk, house, techno and a dash of pop. Pick your side and cheer like fuck!

11pm-3am, £12

Thursday 8 July 2010

July 2010 (Week 2) Clubbing Listings: Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen, and Dundee

Edinburgh

Club: JakN
Venue: GRV
Date: 10th July


Three is the magic number for techno and house club JakN, when they feature S3konZ on three decks over three hours for a princely three pounds. Support comes from Ryan Turner and FuK-NuT with more bar groove DJs to be announced.

10.30pm-3am, £4 / £3 before 12am


Club: Headspin
Venue: Bongo Club

Date: 10th July

It's the second last regular Headspin night before their swansong with DJ Yoda next month (don't worry, there will be special one-off events in the future), so here's a chance to grab an intimate dance with the resident DJs Allan Dunbar, Steve Austin, Dava and Bongo Dave. Visuals from Foundlight.

11pm-3am, £5

Club: Frequency
Venue: The Street
Date: 11th July


Frequency moves to the The Street basement for a four hour pre-club warm-up of dirty, fidgity, and bassy house rubbing shoulders with techno drunk on Detroit and acid. Kris Meja (Fixate Records), Tony Nicol (Fuse) and Shaun Johnston rock the foundations.

9pm-1am, £0

Glasgow 

Featured Club of the Week: Wrong Island
Venue: Nice 'n' Sleazy
Date: 10th July


Wrong Island celebrate resident Teamy's birthday this month with plenty helpings of techno, disco, electro, dubstep and more with resident Dirty Larry.

Lo-Quality spoke to Teamy and chatted new ventures, new tunes and self-indulgence.

So, it's your 30th birthday! What is lined up for Wrong Island celebration-wise? "Shhhhhh! Don't tell everyone! Wrong Island is always a fun and drunken affair so I imagine it'll be much the same this month. I'm going to pack a bag of records later tonight and I'm thinking I'll pack things that I associate with my friends or vice versa. It's probably a bit self-indulgent but if you can't be self-indugent on your birthday, when can you be? It's not like I'm known for restraint at the best of times."

What tracks will feature on the night - any new material you've recently got your hands on and will play out for the first time? "Yeah, I recently started working with my friend Aleks on some music of our own and so I will be playing the final version of our remix of Hot Chip's 'Alley Cats' on Saturday and maybe some other stuff. I got sent some nice promos this month which I'll most likely play out: something from the new Den Haan EP on Supersoul, a new Ramadanman cut and other stuff. Mostly though, I'll be sticking to stuff people will recognise. It's a party after all."

What's happening for Wrong Island in the year ahead? "We're DJing at the Electric Frog Carnival in August which I am very excited about as Liquid Liquid are playing. The Hot Chip remix we did has a very obvious tribute to them at the end. It's also our third birthday in September. We should get planning a special party for that.

"We have so much fun doing the party at Nice & Sleazy, so that will definitely be staying on the calender. We'd like to bring some guests to the city but it's not easy financially. I can't help but feel that smaller affairs are starting to become to way people are headed, whether that's because people are skint or because of a general malaise towards big, soulless clubs (or maybe clubs in general, I don't know.) Sometimes guests are a let down as they've been so hyped up that they can't live up to people's expectations. I'm not exactly old school but I still like nights that have residents only or the occasional guest when it's a special night. You get a much more consistent night-out that way. It's a lot harder in some ways though as you don't get anything to grab people's attention. It's worth it in the long run though."

Just how Dirty will Dirty Larry be for this special birthday event? "I heard he hasn't washed in over a month in preparation. If that isn't Wrong, then I don't know what is. Haha!"

11pm-3am, £3 / Free before 11.30pm

Extra: Check out resident Teamy's mix to promote his new night 'ayeTunes'! "It's a busy weekend for me; I've just started a weekly pub shindig at MacSorley's and the de facto first one is this Friday (9th July). I'm going to try to make the Friday pub thing something a bit different from what we do at Wrong Island. I don't really think club music should be heard in pubs. Certainly not a full night of it anyway. It sort of pulls away from the essence of what pubs are about for me, namely drinking and talking with friends. So this will be more the sorts of things that I'd listen to in the house or maybe after hours."


Club: Subculture
Venue: Sub Club
Date: 10th July


It's all very secretive this week, with a 'super secret' guest hitting the decks with resident Domenic. Suspicions point to a T in the Park DJ; Carl Cox, Plastikman, Sven Vath, Ivan Smagghe, Dubfire... we can but dream... until Saturday night when all is revealed!

11pm-3am, £10

Aberdeen

Club: Everything Else Sucks
Venue: Origin
Date: 10th July


Grab a cheap and dirty music fix from Everything Else Sucks and their residents' night, hosted by Djamba, Eezma, and Krazzy Martin for the finer things in life - electro, house and techno!

11pm-3am, £5

Extra: Check out the EES's Courtyard Party at Enigma on 31st July to warm up for their special guest August slot!

Wednesday 7 July 2010

Have you got the Urge?



Urge Mode is a new Scottish net-label, assembled as part of the "single unifying outlet" Black Lantern Music; artists from all walks of life and different scenes have the opportunity to release their music - think of a mall for goods, divided into different stores. Indeed browsing round the Black Lantern site is like rifling the rails of dance, and the remit is so broad that head of sub-label Urge Mode, Morphamish is not sure if there is one at all - "there's room for any interesting music."

The website is a three channel collaboration, and he explains that each channel can be considered as different points on the same map; Neverzone, Weaponizer and Urge Mode "fulfill overlapping functions within Black Lantern Music." Neverzone looks after the experimental hip-hop and electronic side of things; Weaponizer holds the trip-hop and art-rock slant, and Urge Mode keeps a keen eye on the dancefloor. "Again it does overlap a fair bit - we don't want to be majorly strict with ourselves. Weaponizer puts out some dubstep and Neverzone some electronica, but it's always in keeping with its identity. It's just nice to have faith in each other's choices, and not entirely needing to confer about decisions regarding what to release, while still collaborating with each other taking the label as a whole forward," says Morphamish.


Three channels are up and running (Urge Mode the most recent of these), outputting 18 releases to date and enabling the team to "get a diverse output that still hangs together as a label." Urge Mode itself was "born out of a love of all bass music, and not feeling the need to stick to a style; to draw from anywhere and everywhere, as long as it's compelling."

To date the label has had three releases, described by Morphamish as "hard-edged and dark", a style Urge Mode dearly loves, but insists that another side will be shown over the next few EPs, sporting melodic, deep and warm tracks based around the experimental dubstep, breakbeat and techno scenes. Pencil in these forthcoming beats in your diaries now, and note the names of Drokkr, Shatterfreak, Tactus, Boondock and Supasub, the latter of which is Morphamish's own collaboration with Club Volume! resident Paranoise. "Overall there will be mellowness, grooviness and outright mentalism in equal measure - many diverse, weird and wonderful releases, plus some special super deluxe guerilla events", he tells Lo-Quality.


How do Urge Mode select these artists? "Natural selection - if they can survive seven death-defying tasks to bring me an exquisitely flavoured delicacy from the very edge of the world - providing it sounds good we'll put it out!"

One thing you will immediately notice about the site is a lack of pound signs or 'add to cart' labels: indeed the music is free download, and it's difficult to see where the money-making element comes into it. "The ethos is just to put out great music without compromise, to as many people as possible," he explains, "It's all free download. These days unless you are pretty big you are only going to make money from from live shows anyway, so why not give people the music, we want it to be heard." And with that, Lo-Quality is astonished at how easy and uncomplicated it almost seems; in the battle for distribution rights and peer-to-peer clashes here is a division of labels who will let you access music for free, on the reasoning that it if you dig it you'll probably make the effort to see the artist live. As a portion of illegal downloaders will agree, downloading is similar to Fopp Record Shop's 'Suck it and See' policy - why spend money on a track you'll detest, when you can make a decision prior to purchase and spend your money in the right places; like on a gig you actually want to see, than a CD you may end up using as an indoor frisbee.

So what urges will we feel when we hear the new Urge Mode releases? "Whatever feels natural at the time, you'll know when you feel it. Most often it's to frolic naked, grinning, skipping and shouting for joy into the great beyond for a bright and beautiful tomorrow/tonight."

Grab live Urge Mode action when Morphamish and Texture perform at the Wickerman festival's poetry stage this month.



Urge Mode Artists and Releases
  • The Crooked One A.K.A. Blackmass Plastics (Rag and Bone, Combat) - 'The Spinal Conflict EP'
  • Drokkr (Stupid Fly, Crossroads)
  • Paranoise (Volume, Nerve, Apparition)
  • Stick 430 (Irridium, Cube) - 'Don't Forget The Mixer'
  • Tactus (Jungledub, Abaga records)
  • Leith Weapon A.K.A. Operator (Scandinavia, Mighty Robot)
  • Morphamish+Texture (previously Double Helix) (Audiodacity, Labrat) - 'The Urge Mode EP'
  • Boondock A.K.A. The Coldharbour Crackhead (Confusion)
  • Shatterfreak (Subversus/Stomp) - 'A Stitch In Sine'
  • More TBA

Tuesday 6 July 2010

Vinyl & Digital Reviews: Baobinga, New Kind of Porn, Los Updates vs Argenis Brito and Nick Thayer

July reviews for you people! (Originally written for Clash Magazine July/August 2010)



Baobinga - Steak 003 (Steakhouse)
...always produces a meaty selection

Raggastep professor Baobinga is pushing the bass and the 'future garage' movement for a meaty 4 track release; compacting hyper electro and dancehall on 'Wine Up ft Killa Benz'; adding a glass-like texture to the beats on 'Raggipahop ft Rubi Dan', and competing bass against deep stabs and euphoric chord changes.

Release date: 5 July 2010

New Kind of Porn - Decision to Resist (Superstonic)
...making these tracks

The shock tactics of the name is mistakenly interesting; sounding like an electro Blues Brothers at first, 'Decision to Resist' slices into Apollo 440-esque guitar rock and comes off sounding like a movie chase scene. 'V.2' takes the electro edge further, exploring the Dragonettes' playground.

Release date: 12 July 2010


Nick Thayer - Just Let It Go (Passenger)
... and ramp up the energy!

Nick Thayer's 16 track LP swings between the Justice tones of electro and breakbeat on 'Bring On the Drums', dancehall vibes on 'Zombies' and drawls everywhere Sporty-O appears. Dnb-style builds are employed as the default tension creators (a little draining eventually) and macho growls deploy attitude to rival the tracks' ferocity - food for thought.

Release date: July 2010

Los Updates vs Argenis Brito (Nice Cat Records)
... bringing cumbia to the masses

Capturing the feel-good festival sentiment, these Chilean dance purveyors blend traditional cumbian music with house and metallic winces on 'Valparaiso (No te olvdes, Panchito)'. 'Dont Take Candy From Strangers' punches in the electro and techno influences but prolongs the breakdown a tad, and 'Candy' imbues an
irresistible ass-shaking latin shuffle.

Release date: 24 July 2010

Thursday 1 July 2010

Free tunes: Adam Freeland - How to Fake Your Own Life

FREE MP3: How To Fake Your Own life (Étienne de Crécy remix)

Download it here
This is the first Adam Freeland solo release since the Hate EP and his first release since his band's 'COPE™' album last year. Freeland gave the parts of the track to Étienne de Crécy before he had finished mixing the original, and Étienne beat him to it! Taking this absolutely huge riff from the original and adding his own squiggly analogue synths and an arrangement that has been tried and tested in Freeland and Etienne's recents sets, we can confirm this mix tears big rooms apart. After his recent remix for Joker, as well as being featured on Fabric's 'Elevator Music' compilation, and a forthcoming EP on Plastician's Terrorhythm label as well as various remixes due in 2010 including Foreign Beggars, Pure Phase, Kidkanevil, and Take (Alpha Pup/Eat Concrete), rising producer Om Unit turns in a great mix. Adam was nominated in the best 'Indie Dance Artist' category in the Beatport Music Awards, and has a packed touring schedule for taking in many festivals this summer.