Utility Fog

Sunday, 23rd of May, 2010

Ah, network problems abound tonight, but I'm staying up late for you, kidz! So yes, you can LISTEN AGAIN, check bottom of playlist.

Started tonight with three tracks from the excellent North / South / East / West compilation of Bass music from both sides of the Atlantic. Daedelus’ track is one of his best in ages. I meant to play something else from Daedelus, but the whole segment with Four Tet remixes etc will have to wait till next week!
A little hip-hop vignette from Flying Lotus and then Skream gives us an almost technoid dubstep tune.

Emika is a new (to me) dubstep producer, and she takes the genre into the pop world with some very nice vocals. The Scuba remix is on par with all his recent stuff, but her original mix is even better!

I played a mix of a whole stack of Clubroot tunes - mostly from his new album II - MMX, during which I think I convinced myself it's a whole lot better than I'd though :) It has very much that ambient/rave-comedown thing going on, as did the previous, but that's his style. It's lovely listening.

From Emika we went to Valerie Trebeljahr's disembodied vocals in the classic bomb the bass / lali puna track "clearcut", here remixed by an artist I've been rediscovering this week, Thomas Knak aka Opiate. We had a number of examples of his highly intricate production, including another couple of remixes, of Piano Magic (from a wonderful remix 12" that's now available digitally) and, more recently, Icarus.

Also from the archives (although only back to 2005) is alog’s wonderful track, combining Reichian minimalism with a sortof folktronic bent. Coincidentally I was reminded of alog when chatting with Shoeb Ahmad a few weeks back, and we heard next from his duo Spartak, whose track was described (approvingly) as "weird shit" by one listener.
Gail Priest also contributes some (beautiful) weird shit, impeccably recorded, and as always so is Machinefabriek’s gorgeous slow-growing drone piece (from the Daas album that featured in last week's show as well).

Next up, a little Autechre-fest, in celebration of their Australian gigs coming up this week. Friday at the Forum in Sydney, huge anticipation building up. I have to say, both tracks I played from their new album Oversteps show them at the top of their form - sonically inventive, imbued with emotion...

Oneohtrix Point Never has a new album out next month on legendary Austrian electronic label Editions Mego, but tonight I played the title track of a recently-reissued single. I'm pretty sure this is quite an old recording, but it shows his aptitude for analog synths and sequencers, and the second half is very pretty indeed! Next week we'll be hearing from fellow travellers Emeralds’ newie, also on Mego.

Crab Smasher continue to produce some of the most intriguing and effective music in the Sydney area. The live piece is a kind of noisy krautrock, and the track from their new cassette is really beautiful.

From the looks of the first track released from the new Menomena album, it's gonna be awesome. This track has all their trademarks, from the vox and big drums to the piano refrains and even saxophones (used in a good way, don't worry!)

Finally, another track from the truly fantastic new Sage Francis album. This one, featuring Califone among others, is one of the highlights musically on the album. I'm still to listen closely to the lyrics, but there's some good shit there.

Daedelus - A Bloodworth [Bleep]
Flying Lotus - Rickshaw [Bleep]
Skream - Slumfunk [Bleep]
Emika - Drop the Other (Scuba's Vulpine Remix) [Ninja Tune]
Clubroot - Waterways [Lo Dubs]
Clubroot - Talisman [Lo Dubs]
Clubroot - Solar Flares [Lo Dubs]
Clubroot - Whistles & Horns [Lo Dubs]
Clubroot - Chamber [Lo Dubs]
Emika - Drop the Other [Ninja Tune]
bomb the bass / lali puna - clearcut opiate version [morr music]
Opiate - Srain [April Records]
Piano Magic - The Canadian Brought Us Snow (Opiate Remix) [morr music]
Opiate - amstel [morr music]
Icarus - Keet (Opiate rmx) [Rump]
alog - severe punishment and lasting bliss [rune grammofon]
Spartak - Sleepstalker [Low Point]
Gail Priest - Gravity [get via Bandcamp!]
Machinefabriek - Flotter [Cold Spring]
Autechre - known(1) [Warp]
Autechre - second peng [Warp]
Autechre - V-Proc [Warp]
Autechre - Yuop [Warp]
Oneohtrix Point Never - Young Beidnahga [Synth Series]
Crab Smasher - The Morning After (live at Auraltered State) [Monstera Deliciosa] {free download! This was an ace gig.}
Crab Smasher - digging a hole in a dried up lake [Monstera Deliciosa/Bandcamp]
Menomena - Five Little Rooms [Barsuk] {download this cut from their new album via Pitchfork}
Sage Francis - 16 Years [Strange Famous/ANTI-/Epitaph]

Listen again — ~ 178MB

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