David Kennedy has always been a name to follow ever since tracks like ‘Offal’ and ‘Blimey’ started to surface under the Ramadanman moniker on labels like Soul Jazz and his own co-run Hessle Audio imprint in 2008. Since then his ascension to becoming one of the most eloquent and spatially aware producers on the – for lack of a better catch all term – bass music scene has been quick and decidedly fruitful.
Any followers of our prose here will no doubt be versed in his use of powerful basslines, field recordings and his love affair with his recently acquired classic drum machine sample pack. In the tail end of last year, he really grew to prominence unleashing anthems like ‘Work Them’ on Swamp 81’ and ‘Glut’ on Untold’s Hemlock imprint; but when you consider both the fact that he released 8 singles last year (under his Pearson Sound guise - the one he’ll be using henceforth - as well as as Ramadanman) and the quality of each of them it really doesn’t come as a surprise that he’s gracing clubs the world over every weekend.
“It’s ridiculous really but hey… it’s just making the most of it,” he tells us of his constant travelling over a crackling phone line. “Especially as I’m young and energetic, I can take it a bit more than some people who’ll perhaps get bitter [laughs]. I can quite easily function on no sleep whereas I know some people for whom doing an all nighter would throw them for a week or whatever. I seem to be able to handle it at the moment…”
“I had a lot of stuff out last year so it’s gonna bit a bit quieter inevitably,” he muses when the snatched conversation turns to forthcoming material for the early part of 2011; “but I’ve got a Maurice Donovan 12 inch - the Chicago House legend is making a comeback for 2011 - that’s coming on Sssssss or whatever it’s called. Then there’s a little white label which is coming on Night Slugs in probably a month or two…”
All of this is of course in addition to his contribution to his instalment in the fabric mix series, FABRICLIVE 56, which is due out next week. It’s an impeccable mix, drawing on Kennedy’s hard drive packed with exclusive blends and unreleased productions as much as it does his current DJ sets. It’s a mix that cements his raised profile and continuing residency at the London nightclub perfectly.
In honour of his launch party for the CD, happening at fabric this Friday which features a Room One lineup to rival any club (the full Hessle Audio trio + Joy Orbison, Mala b2b Pinch, Julio Bashmore and Midland) we’ve been given 2 copies of FABRICLIVE 56 and 2 pairs of tickets to the rave itself to giveaway. More info on the event itself is available here.
To be in the running to win these prizes just email us the answer to the following question by the end of play on Thursday.
Q: David Kennedy’s club night, which he runs up in Leeds, is called what?
Please note: winners will be notified by email.
UPDATE: You can stream 30 mins of FABRICLIVE 56 thanks to The FADER.
The 2nd issue of Trap Magazine should be in shops and on streets (not literally, though if it is, pick it up and read it) now. Harbouring an interview, penned by yours truly, with SBTRKT, a chart from Hessle Audio and selector general, Ben UFO, and assorted reviews it also features accomplished interviews with Jammer and Mumdance, Spectrasoul and Logan Sama and more.
You can read it online below, but grab a physical copy if you can. The paper quality is gorgeous.
When West Norwood Cassette Library’s debut turned up earlier this year, it presented a confusing front. Considering 2010’s growing fetish for cassettes among lo-fi circles and an increasing tendency towards nostalgia (both from the lighthearted, often throwaway output of the chillwave set, and the warped, disturbing vignettes emerging from Not Not Fun and Olde English Spelling Bee), here was a producer whose name suggested an obsession with looking backward. Hell, before spinning ‘What It Is’ for the first time I fully expected to hear beats coated with static and analogue crackle, a thin haze of distortion and perhaps some heavily reverbed vocals chucked in for good measure. That it proved instead to be a jittery, anxious take on dubstep’s mutant template was a surprise, but a welcome one; instead of taking a rose-tinted look at the past, this was an impressively futuristic statement.
Still, with the release of his last 12” – the shimmering, deep house infused ‘Mrs. Fingers’ – and now the latest, ‘Blonde On Blonde’, his name has begun to make far more sense. ‘Mrs. Fingers’ offered a vision of dubstep as derivative of early house, all delicately swirling chords and a peculiar, offset groove. It occupied much the same territory as DJ Sprinkles’ gorgeous, elegiac Midtown 120 Blues album, examining the past with an emotive, if time detached, eye. ‘Blonde On Blonde’ goes one further, and sees him craft an anthemic slice of jackin’ house that, were its production values not subtly indicative of now, could have been made at any time over the last twenty years or so. Which isn’t to say it doesn’t fit neatly into current UK music trends; despite its gritty pockmarked surface, WNCL’s sound has an appreciation for bass-heavy immediacy that marks it out as a product of now. In that sense he fits neatly alongside much of the Olde English Spelling Bee label roster, who rebuild the sounds of the past into shapes that, whilst referential, are just as concerned with recent developments.
Securing man of the moment David Kennedy for the remix was a wise move; if the A-side delights in house music’s past, Pearson Sound’s version stares into its future. Admittedly it’s one of his subtler tracks in a while, slowing the juke and jungle inflections of his big hitters from this year (‘Work Them’; ‘Grab Somebody’; ‘Blanked’) into a stammering slo-mo groove, but delicately sliced vocals and a convincingly massive, synth-laden breakdown in the middle give the game away. A disorienting double kick-drum pulse lends the whole thing an aura of menace, like coming to your senses at 7 or 8 am and suddenly realising you’re left with one hell of a long, cold journey home. While it lacks the distinct percussive tics of much of his recent music, as usual you’re left safe in the knowledge that Kennedy continues to operate within his own unique, but impressively broad, niche.
Words: Rory Gibb Out: Now
West Norwood Cassette Library - Blonde On Blonde [Teal]
David Kennedy's work under the Pearson Sound and Ramadanman monikers has made a huge mark on the music community over this last year. From the very first Soul Jazz housed release of Pearson Sound material, 'Gambetta' b/w 'so Far Ago,' Kennedy displayed a keener interest in diversifying his track templates, ramping up his woodblock percussion with tracks like 'Wad' - released on his own co-run Hessle Audio label - and scoring dancefloor anthems with beats like the recent Swamp81 backed, 'Work Them.' His deviation from the conventional 'dubstep' template has already been greatly discussed, even on these super long, text loaded pages but at the time of posting he's currently toying with the public's very notion of his music.
Pouring ghetto house and juke influences into his music, bringing that constant bass thump and endlessly repeated vocal hooks, his newer material that club goers or Benji B's new BBC Radio 1 show have been privvy to, absolutely slays. There's that bass weight - a pure frequency slab that has always been present in everything he's ever released - but its really his swirling percussion and drum work that's making him stand thigh and tail above the competition. His new bits are punishing, totally bruising the well equipped soundsystems that he's wheeling them out on, so it gives us a great pleasure to be able to offer up an exclusive 320 from the man himself - yep you can download Ramadanman's brooding remix of Spark, and her track 'Revolving' which is forthcoming on 679.
The latest edition of the Sonic Router opinion column on theQuietus focuses on Joe who has to date released music on Hessle Audio and Apple Pips...
First releasing 'Grimelight' b/w 'Rut' on the closely watched Hessle Audio in April of last year, the unknown Joe - and his efficient command of stylistically brutal percussion, minimal arrangements, thick sub bass and subtle strokes of melody – has taken over a year to provide a follow up. In the last six weeks or so, though, he has hit out with a quickly succeeded duo of platters: an untitled piece backed with 'Digest' for Appleblim's Bristol based Apple Pips label and his DJ tool-come-party-starter 'Claptrap' b/w 'Level Crossing' for Hessle. Thankfully each piece he's released has been worth the prolonged silence, jumping out from the off with stuttering drum lines and or a sense of groove that's now recognisably his: a playful yet mature exploration of unadulterated percussion and minimal sound colouration.- Oli Marlow
To his credit, it’s getting harder and harder to talk about David Kennedy’s music without sounding hyperbolic. Already this year he’s put out a steady stream of groundbreaking releases, each of which has effectively redesigned what was already a very malleable template into an entirely new form. Perhaps even more impressive – if just as unsurprising, given his record over the last couple of years – is the sheer level of quality control he manages to exercise over his music, as though it’s literally impossible for the guy to make a bad tune. In the last three months alone, his first Pearson Sound release in a while toyed with the same Autonomic ideas he first explored on his remix of Scuba’s ‘Tense’, to dramatic effect. The output of his usual Ramadanman alias, on the other hand, has shot literally through the roof: the drum machine blasts and delicate vocal chemistry of ‘Glut’, where juke’s battle-scarred 808s were put to the service of something far more intangible, jittery junglist stylings on his self-titled Hessle Audio EP, a Todd Edwards lovin’ collaboration with Midland, and a seemingly endless array of quality remixes.
So trying to trace a steady path through Kennedy’s maze is proving a little nightmarish, but on the evidence of his latest plate for Swamp81 it’s probably safest to say his optimum working state is one of perpetual change. The shifts are usually incremental – ‘Work Them’ is a not-so-distant relation of ‘Glut’, with a rapidly descending upper register drum hit that strafes the dancefloor, and ‘Fall Short’ possesses the same nervy, restless energy as the best tracks from his self-titled effort – but they are suggestive of a mind that operates in constant motion. ‘Work Them’ is the obvious big hitter on here. Appropriately for the following release on Swamp81, it’s the bigger, badder and smarter brother of Addison Groove’s ubiquitous ‘Footcrab’ (I always preferred ‘Dumbshit’ anyway), crafted with a careful sleight of hand that allows its monotonous groove to be both maddening and compulsive at once. Halfway across its length, Kennedy opens up the mix to a stunningly elegiac wash of harmony, thoroughly putting paid to the false notion that anthemic in any way equals unsubtle.
‘Fall Short’, though, is the superior cut on an already superior twelve. Like ‘A Couple More Years,’ the almost unbearable melancholy Burial is able to inject into his tracks fully permeates its skeletal percussive structure. It’s as though Kennedy’s built another ‘Work Them’, then proceeded to subtract every extraneous element and leave nothing but the barest essentials. The result, as with so much of his recent music – and that of the rest of the Hessle Audio stable – defies many of the notions of what ‘dubstep’ is, or ought to be. If you can even call it that anymore; in future, I have my suspicions that this sort of stripped-back, polyrhythmic bass sound may well be referred to simply as ‘Hessle music.’ As mentioned earlier, I’m cautious of sounding excessively hyperbolic by praising Ramadanman this highly at what is still a comparatively early stage in his career, but in five or ten years’ time, if people aren’t looking back to this twelve as a crucial step in the genre’s ongoing evolution, I’ll eat my own copy.
This week marks another milestone for us: our 50th installment in the Sonic Router mix series. A tidy number and a goal we’ve achieved that, when we started, we never really knew we had. Without looking back at the past 18 months with glossy eyes, patting ourselves on the back, high five-ing all of our separate achievements since we first unleashed Rekordah’s 20 minute plus beat tape, we’re focusing all our attention on the future. And whilst we're more than aware this is a poignant moment for our humble blogspot, we’re still more than content to always be looking for the next thing... that next producer whose tunes make us hustle to educate our friends, familiars and the wider internet at large.
One such dude we felt compelled to push, is Blawan. The Hessle Audio backed producer – his debut 12” on the label ‘Fram’ b/w ‘Iddy’ was released recently – has a strong and rugged approach to his drum lines; a similarity he shares with label mate Joe and to a lesser extent - given this player’s more dancefloor centric wanderings of late, Ramadanman. Making tonal wanderings simply from his selected percussion he booms out bass stabs on ‘Iddy’ rollocking through the beat’s progression with whispered layers of phrase and machine hum atmospherics plucked straight from the bows of dystopian warships and the winding lead synth on ‘Fram’ could have been taken straight out of Kode 9’s ‘Black Sun’ era. It’s simply the way he cracks out his drum loops that grabbed our attention, subtle snaps of snare drum piquing through the top end perfectly.
We caught up with the South Yorkshireman between train journeys, giving him the opportunity to further introduce himself and his music ahead of his forthcoming date at fabric for the Hessle Audio takeover...
Sonic Router: Can you provide those who may not know you with a bit of background info?
Blawan: For starters I am not Ben UFO despite the kind rumors. My name is Jamie, I am a DJ/Producer originally from the cultural melting pot that is Barnsley and I recently had my debut release on Hessle Audio.
Outside of music who are you? What do you do on the daily?
On the daily, I drink a lot of tea, don't finish tunes, delete ones that I have finished and get easily distracted...
How did you first get into making music? What was it that infected you to do so?
Like a lot of people, school really got me into music. I went to a pretty rough school that thanks to Labour's deprived schools policy had mint facilities, so I started playing drums at the age of 10. I first got into making electronic music on a dodgy version of Fruity Loops when I was 15 but didn't really get serious about making tunes until I was about 18. Prior to the Hessle Audio release I had a pretty random musical background. I used to drum in a couple of bands playing like post-punk stuff as well as making dance tunes, and just muddled it along until now.
What’s your production set up like? What’s your favourite bit of kit in the studio?
My set-up is pretty simple, I run Ableton Live, midi controllers and some decent monitors… oh and some nice flat response headphones and that's really it. My favorite bit of kit has to be my Ozone 4 plugin; it’s a sweet all rounder.
Where do you take inspiration from when making music? And how did you get into this current flux of dubstep?
Erm, that's a hard question, I've always found it hard to pin point what inspires me to make a tune and to be honest I still don't really know. I think trying to keep my mind occupied when making a tune helps, as I find makings tunes when am bored rarely has a decent outcome or it ends up turning out as some weird jacking house thing.
I got into dubstep around late 2004/5. Before this, mates from Sheffield used to send me their badly recorded vinyl rips of Big Apple releases and old garage tunes and things just carried on down the usual routes from there really. I've also always had a passion for house music and think that's had a big impact on me musically. The tune that really pushed me to think I wasn't just making some weird garage type music was Pangaea's ‘You & I’ (HES006). The vibe caught me perfectly, it's still easily my favorite tune to date.
How would you describe your sound? You’ve got this proper tough percussion going on that drives everything… is the rhythm a main focus for you when making tunes?
Honestly, if I could just make drum loops for a living I would. Percussion is definitely something I focus a lot of my attention on when producing. Other elements of my tunes are always considered but are subtle enough to make sure they don't take away purpose from the rhythm and percussive melodies. The outcome of that in a tune is something minimal, but I fought my last battles with complex synth arrangements a long time ago and bare rhythms win hands down for me each and every.
Your first couple of releases are out now on Hessle and Folkwood respectively. How did you link the releases?
My debut with Hessle was a pretty surreal affair, I had a few tunes that had been sitting around and one day, I just said ‘Fuck it. I’ll send these to Untold.’ I did that then within about 2 hours I got a phone call off David (Ramadanman) saying Jack sent him the tunes and the guys liked them and want to put something out. A simple but crazy outcome and I can't tell you how lucky I feel to be in the Hessle camp. Oh and I still haven't bought Jack a drink yet to thank him.
The folkwood thing really was something that happened a while ago, a group of friends at Uni got hold of some cash to press up some music. They asked me to submit a track so I did. The tune is kinda old now, but it’s nice to get bits out there when you can. Big up Ste Shine on that one! Oh and you guys for the kind words about it…
What other projects have you got in the pipeline? What’s happening with you in the rest of 2010? Gigs, releases, personal growth etc?
2010 has been an amazing year already; I am just focusing on putting out tunes I am happy with, when I can so theres no rush. Hopefully DJing as many gigs as I can because that's what really gets me making more music. There are a couple of things in the pipeline that should be surfacing soon, so watch this space.
Any words of wisdom for our readers?
Yes, it needs to be strong with one sugar and milk. Secondly, catch me at Fabric on the 20th August, for the Hessle Audio takeover.
1. Titus 12 - Step Up (Mosca Remix) [Unreleased] 2. Afefe Iku - Bodydrummin' (S63 Refix) [Silver Label] 3. Ludacris vs Joe - How Low Claptrap (DJ Orgasmic Bootleg) [Unreleased] 4. Wookie - Weird Science [Manchu] 5. Randomer - Be Electric [Unreleased] 6. Mistamen - Lengthy Riddim [Bass Tourist] 7. DJ Faz - Believe [Locked On] 8. Menta - Sounds Of Da Future [Sounds Of Da Future] 9. Unknown - Unknown [Unreleased] 10. Untold - Angry Hat [Unreleased] 11. Commix - How You Gonna Feel (Pangaea Remix) [Unreleased] 12. Unknown – Unknown [Unreleased] 13. Ramadamman - Fall Short [Swamp81] 14. Blawan - Potchla Vee [Unreleased] 15. Oris Jay - Trippin (2010 Dub) [Gusto] 16. Untold - Come Follow We [Unreleased]
Catch Blawan at the Hessle Audio Room 3 takeover at fabric on 20th August alongside 2562, Ramadanman, Ben UFO and Pangaea - Addison Groove performs live in Room One on the same night alongside the first ever live set from Hessle affiliate Cosmin TRG. You can also catch Blawan taking to the airwaves of the newly FM licensed Rinse FM on 12th August on the Hessle Audio show from 12-2am.
Blawan came out the blocks hard with his first release on Hessle Audio, stripped back, tough and uber percussive - just the way we like it. Hard tribal beats got chopped and flipped into rolling grime-like approximations of garage and dubstep via a rolling techno sensibility that hits in the perfect place between dance floor headiness and propulsive head nodding energy that verges on the meditative if you weren’t so busy catching yourself on those rhythms. His second release, featured on the A-Side, comes on Folk Wood with Ste Shine, whose deeper vision balances out the 12” nicely.
The lazer guided synths blips on Blawan’s ‘Jackel Ter9’s’ ride the rolling grooves like a twisted sibling of grime’s past with smeared synth textures taking over adding a twisted energy that really bursts out the speakers. Shades of Kode9’s ‘Black Sun’ can be heard in the down tuned synth squiggles, but its taken into a different placem plus the rhythmic patterns echo the tough tribalism of his first release, a hybrid sound that does that more dubstep inherent thing of balancing space and time to create dance floor tension that oozes pent up energy.
Ste Shine drops an altogether deeper and more spaced out track in ‘Mid-life Crisis,’ one that harnesses melodic synth patterns and the original dubstep vibe that gets twisted into a tense almost sinogrime shape that gets crossed with an early Warp era energy; drum hits get tweaked and dubbed into orbit, bass pulses hit the chest and the synths get seriously hypnotic with their melodies.
You know you've heard/read us singing David Kennedy's praises since day dot of this tedious publication. His 'Wad' 12" under his Pearson Sound alias remains one of the most insightful things thats happened to Sonic Router HQ's Tannoys and his forthcoming smasher, 'Work Them' 12" as his more commonplace Ramadanman moniker is set to drop on Loefah's Swamp 81 label in two weeks time.
Well... dude is playing Bestival this year, so he's done a mix. Trust us, every one that he's ever done has been worth the space in your Temp Files folder and plus it means we got to post this picture where he looks about 12...
After the head-oriented spaces of Dark Arx Recordings’ first release, Binary Sequence’s underrated 'Below The Ice' 12”, the label’s second plate shifts towards a more overtly dancefloor-aimed aesthetic whilst retaining a strong connection. This coherence is largely mood-related: Binary Sequence managed to create an incredibly tangible sense of dissociation with the bare minimum of elements, all awash in static crackle. Dark Arx’s own Blood Vein EP keeps the same mournful feel but ramps up the pace, locking a restrained textural palette to driving post-garage patterns that manage to simultaneously bring to mind techno’s rigidity and the hip-swinging flex of two step.
There’s a distant loneliness to the largely beatless closer ‘Argent & Sable’ that brings to mind some of Sigha’s more minimalist productions, but shorn of rough edges it exudes a sense of calm quite different from the unease a track like Sigha’s ‘Bruised’ evokes. Instead all three tracks on here move like liquid: riding on basslines that are far less viscous than those of many of Dark Arx’s contemporaries, both ‘Blood Vein’ and ‘Streak’ appear to ebb and flow effortlessly. ‘Streak’ is worthy of particular mention, its subtly harmonised synth pads drifting over a beat that shuffles like one of Hessle’s best, rolling for an all-too-short six minutes. The result is an EP that feels far shorter than its runtime, and an intriguing successor to the label’s last twelve.
The twitter literate amongst you might have heard Untold recently upped some new '130 bits' to his myspace, and though it looks like they've been removed, they are really good...
After a wee break, David ‘Ramadanman’ Kennedy has jumped back on the prolific wagon of late, releasing no fewer than three EPs on various labels. The first, his self-titled effort for his own Hessle Audio label, met with general acclaim when it emerged a couple of months ago: tracks like ‘I Beg You’ and ‘No Swing’ felt like a logical step upwards from his earliest productions. Still focusing heavily on the brittle, bone-dry percussion that’s swiftly become a Hessle trademark – witness the monochrome pressure of the label’s latest 12” from Blawan – they showed a leap forward in terms of structure and intricacy. Still, while ‘Tumble’ may have shared the same icy chill as Wiley’s early eski instrumentals, and ‘A Couple More Years’ wielded deftly sliced breaks to devastating effect, there were points where the EP’s clinical precision felt a little too austere to connect with fully.
This new plate on Hemlock, though, is the real deal. It’s certainly the best thing Kennedy’s put his name to since Pearson Sound’s underrated ‘PLSN,’ and lead track ‘Glut’ shares its rattling top-end and peculiar rhythmic sensibility. Its booming 808 kicks and claps place it alongside recent tracks by Addison Groove and Girl Unit in that strange grey area where Chicago juke’s influence is beginning to percolate through UK bass, a region which will doubtless soon open up to far wider exploration. Above all else though, ‘Glut’s gorgeous clipped female vocal and shimmering synth melody lend it a real human warmth. Alongside the build-and-release dynamic of ‘Tempest’, which winds like a spring before suddenly exploding in a burst of noise, it makes for a formidable one-two punch of a twelve.
Big shout to Ben, furthering his mining of discogs and continuing his run of website dominance in sterling fashion with a mix for US site XLR8R and garnering deserved comments like: "one of the best DJ's in the world right now" from the braun behind Electronic Explorations Rob Booth.
Look out for Blawan's 12", 'Fram' b/w 'Iddy,' for Ben UFO's co-run Hessle Audio imprint dropping shortly in shops now.
Following on from FaltyDL’s excellent, house-tinged All In The Place EP, Rush Hour are now putting out a second bass-related twelve. Unsurprisingly given the label’s general output, Cosmin TRG’s contributions are similarly indebted to house music, eschewing the post-garage stutter of his early music but also taking an obviously different approach even to his recent Tempa double pack. That release, Now You Know, found him at a curious juncture in his sound. Neither entirely divorced from the austere Hessle Audio-isms of his earliest music nor fully embracing a ruder dancefloor edge; it was intriguing but ultimately an unbalanced experience.
The two tracks on his Rush Hour 12” further refine the smooth technofied edges he began to explore on ‘Since Last Night’ and ‘Purple Lights,’ flitting smoothly between four-to-the-floor house manoeuvres and soca-style funky percussion. Yet despite their smoother and more coherent feel neither quite manages to reconcile the two sides of his sound, leaving an unresolved tension hanging in the air throughout. ‘Groove Control’ is almost intimidating in its forward momentum, as heavily swung drums open up gaps for fractionally short periods before closing them again. Throughout the track its pulse is offset by Detroit-ish burbling synths, a trait shared with B-side ‘Seeing Other People’. Initially the less confusing of the two, its lopsided vocals and heady pulse gradually wear down the thin border between dancefloor and mind material, making it tough to resolve its questionable motives. Nonetheless, both tracks are immersive listens in their own right and go some way – if not the entire distance - towards answering the riddles posed by CosminTRG’s last release.
Sonic Router's monthly column for URB.com just went live-o today with words on forthcoming releases from Blawan, Joe, Al Tourettes Scratcha DVA, Brackles, West Norwood Cassette Library, Hackman, xxxy, Ike Release, XI, SRC, Swindle and Guido...
Co-founder of Wireblock and subsequently the Numbers label, Spencer, helms the latest FACT Mix featuring stone cold Glaswegian classics and plenty of forthcoming material on their new conglomerate label.
The Jonzun Crew – Space Is The Place (21 Records) Mr Fingers – Distant Planet (Jack Trax) DJ Gregory – Don’t Panic (Gregory and Karizma Dub) (Defected) Cybotron – Cosmic Cars (LP version) (Fantasy) Sully – In Some Pattern (Keysound) Kraftwerk – House Phone (Warner) Autechre – Eutow (Warp) Deadboy – If U Want Me (Numbers) MJ Cole Crazy Love (Todd Edwards Underground Remix) (Talkin’ Loud) Roska – Time Stamp (Rinse) Karizma – Beat Dis (R2) Sticky – Jumeirah Riddim (Mixpak) Altered Natives – Raaatid Einstein (Fresh Minute Music) Ultradyne – E Coli (Warp) Jan Driver – Rat Alert (Music Man Records) Roska and Untold – Long Range (Forthcoming Numbers) Deadboy – Easy (Maybe Forthcoming Numbers / Lost On HD) Yonurican – Boriken Soul (Yonurican Club Mix) Mosca – Nike (Club Edit) (Night Slugs) Anthony Shakir – Spectre (Seventh City) Addison Groove – Dumbsh*t (Swamp 81) SRC – Brakedance (Forthcoming Numbers) Rudekid – London Town (Forthcoming No Hats No Hoods) Terror Danjah – Limbo (Planet Mu) Taz Buckfaster – Future Funk (Forthcoming Numbers) Macabre Unit – Lift Off (Terrorhythm) Addison Groove – Footcrab (Swamp 81) Hakan Lidbo – Walk Away (Todd’s Tell Someone Dub) (Loaded) Untold – No One Likes a Smart-Arse (Hemlock) Kavsrave – PClart (Forthcoming Numbers)
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Opit Records boss lady, Subeena, weaves together a mix exclusively comprised of her own productions, which she's never really done before, for the FADER. Reportedly a mix of old and new ish...
New mix from Ben UFO for the Austrian Rave, Disko 404. Mixcloud only business at this time... but new bits from T++, Joe, Starkey (remixing Terror Danjah) and Rossi B & Luca are all there...
The Bruk DJs, Elgato and Bilal, just linked up a mix ahead of their appearance at fabric for the 4th Hessle Audio takeover which features Ikonika, Ramadanman, Pangaea and Ben UFO - names you'll be no doubt familiar with if you've glanced our way over the past year.
Catch Bruk on Sub.fm - they've taken over the old Ruffage slot on Thursdays between 8-10pm.
The West District Allstars feat. Natasha Watts - Reach Up (Enzyme Black Stripped Dub) Kid Majesty - Desfile De Los Santos Tadow Productions - Rising Sun Stephanie Mills - Free (Domu Stripped Down Remix) Sony - Sugar Rush DVA - Nasty Nasty Nasty (Roska Remix) Xara - You Got Me Crazy Cousinz - Sonar Tonya Renee - About You (Karizma Boucha Remix) DJ 2face - I Love You Plastic Cash - Store Card Ultramarine - Hooter (Carl Craig / Ver. 1.1) Karizma - Necessary Madness Argy - The Storm Thommy Davis - Mars Needs Women
It seems like a mix from Hessle Audio co-owner Ben UFO is fast becoming something of an event. Hailed by many, including Blackdown in his most recent Pitchfork column, as a 'Super DJ' his patchwork of tunes and seamless melding of tracks and styles is undoubtedly up there with the best of the DJs in the scene.
It also seems Scotland's LuckyMe family are also aware of his pon deck prowess, nabbing him to contribute the latest edition of their mix series.
January's URB.com column just went live-o with discussion points ranging from Shortstuff & Hyetal to the new double pack Pangaea EP, Airhead & James Blake, Kuedo, Joy Orbison, Slugabed, Low Limit & Lando Kal, Martyn (and his forthcoming bunch of remixes) plus word on long players from Scuba and Starkey.
