Even more banging techno with: Maike Depas – Midnight Ride #DanceFloorDestroyer

•November 9, 2023 • Leave a Comment

It’s clearly techno week at AcidTed. After yesterday’s trance influenced techno here’s Maike Depas with some hard techno leavened with a bit of Detroit and breaks.

Maike Depas is from Milan, Italy and specialises in Hard Techno tracks. Here’s Midnight Ride his new single which adds some Detroit type techno breaks to the mix to quite spectacular effect. The accompanying blurb talks about it being a mix of Ken Ishii and Joey Beltram. This didn’t quite have Ishii’s precision and simplicity for me. But it certainly has the explosiveness of something like Energy Flash.

Midnight Ride opens with the kick drum rush of hard techno beats but adds a breaks type sub bass. And just when you think it’s going to get heavier, it get lighter with an almost Lionrock type brassy blast of synths. This gives you the full on hands in the air epiphany.

It’s not that there’s anything unique here. But it’s like the best bits of all sorts of pounding techno and breaks tracks welded together into one glorious, adrenaline fuelled whole. Like a distillation of the best bits from Fast And Furious before things got all silly.

This totally delivers on Maike Depas’ promise that “I really tried to give this sensation of driving through a storm on an autobahn 250 km/h.”

Dance floor Destroyer. Deserves to be HUGE.

Posted in breaks, techno
Tags: , , , , ,

Banging techno with: Steven Flynn – Modular Resistance (Nickon Faith remix)

•November 8, 2023 • Leave a Comment

A midweek attack of acid techno today. This comes in the form of a Nickon Faith remix of Steven Flynn.

Steven Flynn is a long standing DJ and artist from Inverness, Scotland. His new release is Modular Resistance. It’s a hardcore, almost suffocating piece of techno. But I’m featuring the remix from Nickon Faith, a Manchester raised and based artist. His work has a sense of trance and melodic techno and this allows the remix to have a bit more space and bounce. See also his Circumambient album which I’ve included below.

The Modular Resistance remix from Faith is not for the faint hearted. This piles on the beats and the acid lines from the outset. But it also offers a spaced background that owes much to trance styles. This makes for a more psychedelic experience.

The remix isn’t afraid to cut back the pummelling for a bit of a breather before cranking things up again with an ethereal spin. Gives the track a lovely sense of variation without losing its focus on the dance floor.

Irresistible dance floor acid techno.

Posted in acid
Tags: , , , ,

Gentle electronica with: Race Banyon – Let It Show

•November 7, 2023 • Leave a Comment

All a bit wearing so something gentle today. Here’s Race Banyon with some lovely soft electronica from his new self-titled album.

Race Banyon (Eddie Johnston) is a producer from Auckland, New Zealand. He’s been making music around for about a decade. His work is closest in style to people like Lane8 with lush dense sounds.

Race has a new self-titled ten track album out (released in October). It’s a lovely listen. But here’s Let It Show from the album to give you a way in.

Let It Show is that intersection between techno and deep house. It’s full of deep rich sounds but with all the edges polished off.

It’s a soft sheen of a track. Beats are chunky with bass but their punch is cleverly blunted. Synths come in waves of chords, always offering something uplifting but nothing so much as to require euphoric. This makes it a satisfying listen, offering lots but without asking too much from you in return.

Wonderful, warm enveloping music. Thanks Race.

Posted in deep house
Tags: , ,

Monday’s techno; It’s techno, kinda: Nonlethal Weapons – Corporate Reflex

•November 6, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Here’s a Monday techno track that advertises itself as “It’s techno, kinda.” Listen to Nonlethal Weapons and make your own judgement.

Nonlethal Weapons is David Kumler once from Seattle but now New Orleans, USA. His background is post-punk, darkwave, garage rock and noise techno. So, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that this isn’t your usual 4/4 techno.

Taken from the album Inappropriate and a little bit sick, here’s Corporate Reflex. It’s a track that’s dark with menace and comes to oppress.

The opening is a buzzing darksynth bass. Beats arrive but late. This is the hum, hiss and burr of the machines. They’ve won.

As the track progresses things get more noise driven and darker with interludes of synthwave anxiety. It’s all terribly dystopian. And we like a bit of dystopia. Don’t we?

This is a great piece of experimental techno that never quite lets up and never lets you off the hook. Challenging and rewarding in equal measure.

Posted in techno
Tags: , , , ,

Ambient Sunday with Jimmi King – Feather

•November 5, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Ambient Sunday is beatless with a returning Jimmi King.

London’s Jimmi King appeared here back in May. Then it was some bright electronica, this time unashamedly Ambient.

The track is Feather and it is as weightless as the title. He says it’s, “the second track from a series of ambient releases. made in London and Vienna.” The other track being Held.

Feather is a big wash of sound with a dreamy spaced air but avoiding the trap of coming across as too ethereal. There’s a lovely opening set of hazy chords backed with tropical birdsong. It’s all terribly wistful and delicate.

It’s one of those tracks where you rather think “nothing’s happening” and then you notice you’re hooked. It’s rolls ever so sweetly on but with a slightly psychedelic effect.

This is one of those tracks that makes me stop and stare, slack jawed in wonder.

Posted in ambient
Tags: , , , ,

Purposeful drum and bass with: Valdy – Purpose

•November 4, 2023 • Leave a Comment

I’m struggling a bit ahead of Mondays funeral but here’s a track to gladden the heart. Some drum and bass from Valdy.

Don’t really know anything about Valdy, save that he’s a new producer from the UK. But musically there’s a lot of maturity here in the construction of the tracks. Here’s Purpose from a twin track release with Distance.

Purpose opens with a bit of sub bass menacingly swirling around a one note piano line. The bass comes on stronger before the beats are unleashed.

The combination of that piano line and some pretty hardcore beats is intriguing. It offers a touch of pop dynamic with something much more urban and gritty. That tension is really rather thrilling.

Amid all the excitement of the beats there lurks a sad and melancholic streak inherent in the piano and the bass keys that give the tune an emotional resonance. This a top top tune.

Posted in drum and bass
Tags: , , , ,

Chill walking with: The Wxlker – Village

•November 3, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Aiming for a quiet weekend, so a chill track from The Wxlker to get in the mood.

The Wxlker is a beat maker from São Paulo who describes the self as “chillhop, lo-fi, beatmaker from Brazil, trying to give some head bopping tunes and sometimes succeding at it.” I’d count featured tune Village as a success.

Village has an unusual origin. The Wxlker explains, “I’m helping a guy with a video game soundtrack and he wanted a sound that was kind of like a video game village. I sent it to him and the sound was rejected. So I adapted it and made it more lofi.”

Shorter than I’d usually feature, this has an exquisite hook playing off acoustic guitar and high end keyboards. Behind there’s a lofi shuffle of beats. It delivers beach sounds and a laid back attitude.

Dunno what this has to do with a village as this is lonesome chilling for me with enough swing for the virtual hammock. Beautiful track for a lie down and be counted out weekend.

Posted in study beats
Tags: , , ,

Through the techno looking glass with: Casha Mour – Glass (2023 House Edit)

•November 2, 2023 • Leave a Comment

How thing go around. Four years ago Casha Mour had his first official release, Glass. It was ok but I wasn’t sold enough to post. Time has passed. And he’s decide to give it a remix. I love it. So here we are.

Casha Mour is the solo project for Daniel Smith from London. In the time since his first release he’s explored some interesting mixes of downtempo, ambient and experimental sounds. All of that gets poured to good effect into the 2023 House mix of Glass.

I say House mix because that’s in the title. But this is hardly conventional house. There’s a bit of hazy ambient and even some techno drive.

As for the title, Casha Mour says “This song was inspired by a gig I went to once in a church; it was freezing and there was no heating, and I thought the juxtaposition of electronica in a church was great. I titled the track ‘Glass’ because of the stained glass windows.”

This remix takes a bit of early Guerilla Records sound, some almost electronic shoegaze, and the best of Biceps’ melodies with a dash of Jamie XX vocals to deliver something reassuringly warm but also just a bit experimental. It’s a heady mix that totally justifies this track getting a remix and re-release.

Posted in house
Tags: , , , ,

Jog on with: Liam McIntyre – Running in the Rain #Downtempo #Electronic

•November 1, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Like so many others, after years of deriding runners, I took up jogging during lockdown. I’ve largely kept it up since but can’t say I really enjoy it. Anyhow, to celebrate a 10k PR in autumnal rain here’s Liam McIntyre with Running In The Rain.

Liam McIntyre is a musician from Los Angeles. He graduated from Berklee College of Music (Mass.) with a degree in Film Scoring. He currently works in at Sparks and Shadows, the studio of film composer Bear McCreary. 

Running In The Rain opens with gentle tinkles of sound. These have a lovely wooziness before a more insistent beat or thrum from the bass comes in.

No surprise then that Liam says “What I was thinking and seeing when making this was someone waking up and going for a jog in the rain. The first repeating synth line is like a gentle alarm clock waking you up, and it eventually builds to a more stable beat, which is kind of the “running”. All of the weird noises and builds in the background create the “rain” or stormy weather vibes to me.”

And, unlike my wheezy efforts, there’s something optimistic and uplifting about the track as it develops. A sort of of epiphany arrives half way through before the wooziness of the opening section reasserts itself.

This may all be quite conceptual but that bass thrum gives this track an engaging richness and drive towards a better… something. You make your own ending here as the fuzziness ends.

Posted in chill
Tags: , , ,

Big Techno beats from: HADŌ – Wave Motion

•October 31, 2023 • Leave a Comment

No messing about today. A stormy and wet UK deserves a bit of a stormer of a track. Here’s HADŌ with Wave Motion.

HADŌ is a techno artist based in London, UK. His work tends to veer towards the more hypnotic end of techno but today’s offering is a big chunky bruiser of a track.

Wave Motion opens with big bass drum beats and a percussive throb that is unafraid to build. In that sense it has more in common with 90s techno that the more immediate gratification of EDM. No easy peaks here.

HADŌ is happy to wait until three minutes in before anything resembling a melody arrives. And when it does it has the clever appeal of Underworld, pitching for a peak that remains elusively out of reach.

A tantalising swagger of a track.

Posted in techno
Tags: , ,

« Previous Entries