Utility Fog

Sunday, 4th of June, 2017

Evening! Electronic sounds of many types tonight, focusing (but not exclusively!) on the analogue.

LISTEN AGAIN for the for an alien travelogue of your dreams… stream on demand at FBi Radio, podcast here.

Starting tonight with the unique sound of Stockholm’s Roll the Dice. Since 2010 they’ve been peddling their mix of analogue synths’ krautrocky chug and acoustic piano – I always particularly loved how the rhythmic piano takes over at the end of the almost Kraftwerkian “See You Monday” from their second album. There’s a certain interest in the industrial age (that title being a reference to returning to work) but also, through member Malcolm Pardon‘s other job making music for film, a soundtracky expansiveness and evocativeness. The other half is Peder Mannerfelt, whose excellent label has released music from Klara Lewis and various other female Swedish electronic producers, and whose grasp of how to twist dancefloor expectations is second to none.
Recently, Peder collaborated with Hodge, a central figure in the contemporary bass/techno scene in Bristol, on an excellent EP of uncategorizable club music.
Meanwhile, Hodge turns up with Livity Sound compadre Peverelist remixing dub techno legends Leftfield, whose massive first album Leftism just got a 22-year anniversary remaster & reissue with its 11 tracks remixed to make up 22 tracks.

A slight swerve on the dancefloor next takes us into drum’n’bass territory, albeit with a tribal/techno/bass movement to it. Samurai Music‘s Shiro sublabel was formed to release emerging artists on vinyl for the first time, and here we have Torn, a dark d’n’b producer from Russia, which is the centre of quite a bit of interesting dance music across plenty of genres. Given how big breakcore was there back in the day, it shouldn’t be too surprising, but there’s some really quality stuff coming out of Russia these days.

Polish producer Lutto Lento is no stranger to the weirder edges of the dancefloor, and a lot of his stuff is more on the house tip, but his latest LP from the ever-reliable Where To Now?Records takes in a bewildering mishmash of beat programming styles and lots of utterly bent sampladelica. There’s a junglist tone around the edges too, just for the segue, and a strong influence from dancehall here. Producer Ludomir Grzelak also composes for theatre and dance.

Darrel Fitton has been releasing his melodic, crunchy electronica since 1994, briefly under his own name but for most of his career as Bola. Although he appeared on Warp‘s second Artificial Intelligence comp, he’s been closely associated with Manchester’s legendary Skam label since its inception. In fact he was integrally involved in the second release from the label, the very first EP from Autechre side project Gescom – and while many Gescom releases can be attributed mostly to Autechre, this first EP is one of plenty where their collaborators’ work is clear as day. Bola’s talent for creating warm, classic synth sounds in both the analogue & digital realms is endless, and he’s one of the most melodically & harmonically talented of the original idm producers.
Fitton’s love of the vocoder goes way back too, present on a number of these tracks, and the angelic vocals on the new album’s “Evensong” were apparently produced without any human vocal chords – impressive if true. But Bola has often featured guest vocals from Dennis Bourne (who does appear on this new album) and others, particularly coming to the fore on the more upbeat second album for 2002, which came out on Peacefrog Records under the name Jello. Both 2002 albums are favourites from his catalogue, but honestly there’s gold all the way through… (And note the puns, including “Bola Jello”, but from the start we’ve got “Bola Soup”, the EP “Bola Mauver”, and the groans go on all the way.)

Last week on the show I played an amazing collaboration between Berlin-based double bass player & sound artist Yair Elazar Glotman and Swedish producer Mats Erlandsson. I went looking and found some great ambient-industrial releases from Erlandsson, including his latest for Posh Isolation, a tribute to the first female astronaut Valentina Tereshkova. These are rich and evocative sounds.

Roll the Dice – Coffin & Nails [The New Black]
Roll the Dice – Into The Ground [Digitalis]
Roll the Dice – See You Monday [Leaf]
Roll the Dice – Aridity [Leaf]
Roll the Dice – Locked Hands [The New Black]
Hodge & Peder – All My Love [Wallroom]
Leftfield – Afro Left (Hodge & Peverelist Mix) [Sony Music]
Torn – Insomnia [Shiro/Samurai Music Group]
Lutto Lento – It’s a Horror and it’s a Wonder [Where To Now?]
Lutto Lento – Cheers Tears Ears [Where To Now?]
Bola – Pelomen Vapour 1 [Skam]
Gescom – Sciew Spoc [Skam]
Bola – Vespers [Skam]
Bola – Pae Paoe [Skam]
Jello – Lungbone [Peacefrog Records]
Bola – Halyloola [Skam]
Bola – Evensong [Skam]
Mats Erlandsson – Etterum [Posh Isolation]
Mats Erlandsson – Glances [Posh Isolation]

Listen again — ~198MB

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