Classic techno from: Miles Lee – Spinal Engine

•December 29, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Much of the techno from Australia is infused with sunshine and positivity. Lots of it is good but truth be told ultimately I prefer techno that recognises its urban machine music origins. So it was a surprise to get some enthralling dark techno from Australia’s Miles Lee. Take a listen to Spinal Engine, it’s damn good.

Miles Lee is from Naarm, Australia. He describes himself as a “sound artist working on Wurundjeri Country ambient/experimental/deep grooves.” Here’s Spinal Engine from the new Corpus EP.

Spinal Engine offers a dark dubby techno opening with a raw sound that pays homage to analog and avoids the sheen of digital. It’s dark, dank, and a little bit grubby. This track plays happily in dark corners of clubs. No glitterball necessary.

There’s a sound of the ‘other’ at work. It’s isolated and thrilled to engage with. The beats have aTechno uncompromisingness but also an almost Ambient lightness. And T he synths have a neo- Afro feel to them. There’s even a bit of early Slam clatter. Six minutes pass in a trice.

Top techno.

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Sad music for sad times: Horizon – Ukrainian Lo-Fi

•December 28, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Sad music alert. Here’s some melancholic study beats from Horizon. Given where we are at the end of the year whether in Ukraine or Israel/Palestine optimism seems in short supply.

Horizon is a Ukranian producer and artist from Kyiv. Perhaps inevitably he started out as a rapper but is now making lofi study beats. Here’s the title track from his new album Ukrainian Lo-Fi.

Ukrainian Lo-Fi is a lovely sad piece. Opening with some gently rippled piano to which beats are added. There’s a lovelorn sense of ethereal background sound. A bit of guitar simply adds to the plaintive sense. And the beats roll on.

This is lovely work in which to contemplate the iniquities of the world and the healing power of music. Just lovely.

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Banish the blues with progressive house from: 44 Ardent – bitbybit

•December 27, 2023 • Leave a Comment

It’s been a series of largely grey and damp days in England this Christmas. Time to banish the greys and blues with some choppy progressive house from 44 Ardent.

44 Ardent is an Australian producer (Callan Alexander) who makes chilled lo-fi house music which is a mix between Bonobo, Tourist and Four Tet. He’s a new album Leo out now from which the featured track bitbybit is taken.

Bitbybit is a beautifully summery slice of low key progressive house with a choppy almost piano house sound. Beats are on the lofi side but that matches the delicacy of the rest of the track.

What dominates here is the stabby piano but with the sound ever so slightly muffled so it doesn’t quite get to out and out piano house territory. This allows it an almost chilled beach house feel alongside electronic trickery worthy of Bonobo. This is laid back, warm and sultry music.

Turn the heating up, stick on a summer shirt and dance the night away. Tinnies optional.

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Boxing Day is in Detroit with: Sheebo – Carl #Techno

•December 26, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Cast off the sloth of Christmas Day. Loosen your straining belt, rise from your sofa, put down those chocolates. It’s time to dance to some Detroit Techno from Sheebo.

Sheebo is from Münich, Germany and says they’re “Telling raw warm little outsider house and techno stories.” Here’s Carl from the Pyro EP.

Carl is pitched as “Classic Detroit 909 + sequencer techno action with a lower tempo.” I’d say this is proper techno, made with love. This track is steeped in early Detroit techno. Unclear if this is named after Acidted favourite Carl Craig but I’d rather hope so.

Despite the lower tempo suggestion this is not for the faint hearted. There’s a proper kick from the bass drum from the get go. Analog synths wriggle around on top. Hard not to want to move as the synths get under your skin and in your brain.

But there’s also a more modern bass that buzzes around. It gives the track a depth and bottom end that it needs. This is perfect club music but also works at home. Solid production from a producer that’s on top of his art.

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Happy Christmas all – Teardrops in the Air

•December 25, 2023 • Leave a Comment
My traditional Christmas tune. Still the best. With thanks to 10000 Spoons and Instamatic. Enjoy your day.

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Ambient Sunday Christmas with: John Hayes – Palms

•December 24, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Ambient Sunday is waiting up to see Santa. Can’t have anything to loud or we’ll miss him. Here’s John Hayes with the beauty of Palms. As Shakespeare says “And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.”

John Hayes is a multi-instrumentalist and producer from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Now based in Denver, Colorado he’s been producing music for the past six years or so. A pianist so it’s no surprise that Palms features a focus on the piano. Except that the piano isn’t by him but Laura La Louve on a Palm piano. See video at the foot of this post.

John says of the track, “it really happened almost by accident. The main element of the track comes from a sample. I had stumbled across Laura’s (La Louve) piano recording on YouTube and fell in love with the performance. I chopped some pieces of it and put it into Ableton.” A drawn out process later and Palms is the result.

Palms is a beautiful piece. It’s much more electronic than piano. The piano is used as a jumping off point in some places and a place to which to return in others. This is a thrumming ambient trance piece of really high quality.

The piano is more evident in the first half of the track and then it gets blended into something that has more a progressive trance feel. Think of deadmau5’ more downtempo moments. It’s deeply thrilling with the added ethereal vocal washes.

Gotta go, think I can hear Santa.

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Minimal Dub Techno from: 59 Perlen – Horizon

•December 23, 2023 • Leave a Comment

A pre-Christmas throb of dub techno from 59 Perlen.

59 Perlen is Matthias Rosenkrantz from Zürich, Switzerland. His biog says “It started all with the C64 (1982). In the late 80s, the Commodore 64 became a mass phenomenon, its SID Chip with unbelievable 3 voices and 64KB of memory was a state of the art music production system and 59 Perlen made his first attempts to create electronic sounds.”

Horizon is taken from the album Forget About The Music, to be released in early 2024. If C64 was the starting point, Basic Channel’s dub techno experiments from the early 90s is the jumping off point for this track.

Horizon is fully immersed in the bass throb around which all good dub techno revolves (it’s the law). But the track is also infused with house and ambient. Pauses and musical phrases have a disco house sheen that lets this track sparkle with an unusual vivacity.

The bass kick has an almost tech house blankness to it. On a big system this would be a totally immersive experience. A calmly confident soundscape of ambitious intent.

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A lonesome trumpet from: Gresham Cash x Denise Cianfaga – Helen

•December 22, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Rather going off piste here. None of my usual electronics but a drawling indie rock from Gresham Cash and the melancholic trumpet from Argentina’s Denise Cianfaga on Helen.

Gresham Cash is an Athens, GA musician, composer, and writer with a background in wildlife biology. His work has mainly been in indie rock. But Helen is the first single from Cash’s forthcoming album Director E, Vol. 1. The album is a compilation of tracks that Cash composed, performed, and produced in the last 8 years working as a composer for Atlanta-based filmmaker Ethan Payne. This is more widescreen and plaintive than his earlier work.

Helen is a mix of the ineffably sad trumpet mixed with some low key post rock. It verges on the Ambient in its delicacy and refusal to rise above a murmur. But it’s the trumpet that really makes this track stand out. It has a slow jazz feel but also a funeral elegy quality. A sort of post rock Last Post.

Hardly the stuff of Happy Christmases but beautiful sadness. 

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Drum and Bass on the rise with: Left-6teen – Levitate

•December 21, 2023 • Leave a Comment

Ease into Christmas with this delicate drum and bass track Levitate from new artist Left-6teen.

Left-6teen is from Manchester, UK but is clearly highly US influenced in writing, referring to “Based out of Manchester” but this has that UK ease with genre blending.

Levitate is a light, sparkly tune. It mixes a rich bass line with high end dnb beats and a stutter vocal that comes over like a chopped guitar line. And then the whole thing is washed through keyboards.

The track is relaxed, sophisticated and slightly stunning for a first release. There’s a confidence in the production and the way the track allows lots of space, resisting the temptation to fill all the holes with sound. This gives the track its loose limbed swagger. Proper, proper young Left-6teen.

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Melodic Techno from NILU (DK)

•December 19, 2023 • Leave a Comment

If you’re feeling a bit funky I have just the thing for you. Some Middle Eastern flavoured melodic techno from NILU (DK).

As you might expect, NILU (DK) comes from Denmark, Copenhagen to be precise. He’s a two track EP out from which featured track Bazaar is taken.

It’s invidious to start with a grumble. But I must. This track is only 2:30 and that’s too damn short. Nonetheless for the duration it’s a properly snaking bit of melodic techno.

Bazaar takes some nice and deep techno beats and welds then to a squelchy elastic bass and some ultra processed synth lines. And then the killer tom toms and a lovely Middle Eastern synth horn. This gives the track a lovely wide open and sinuous flow.

Beats pitter patter their way around to a break that offers such fun and jump around potential. This is classily designed and delivered. Now, if only it was about twice as long and I could have a happy Christmas. Story of my life, always unfulfilled.

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