Electro/club 2021

We will dance again, we will sweat on the dancefloors again, that's a promise. There's no telling yet when it will be possible, but sooner or later that moment will come. Judging by the selection offered here, the producers and DJs themselves can't wait to get back to their ideal dimension, to unleash their creativity in the club around the world. From Australia to Japan, by way of New York and Mozambique, a roundup of the best Eps/12" heard over the past three months, more eager than ever to be played in their rightful setting. Until then, dance, dance, dance till you drop, in the comfort of your own living room!

Ike Release – Night Calling (Episodes)

 

Who knows when we'll get back to living the night, to inhabiting it, to interpreting its rituals, each of us in our own way. It's already calling to us, and Ike Release, with his latest release, invites us to pick up on the message, to translate it ahead of the moment when doing so will no longer be necessary. Deeply nocturnal, drawing on the languages that made his native Chicago great, but with a courtly metropolitan touch that pulls it back toward New York, "Night Calling" is a project of refined house synthesis, thoroughly respectful of the genre's illustrious past but never resting on a nostalgia trip, however elegant, preferring instead a more oblique and distinctive approach. From the insistent stabs that coat the melodic bed of the title track (as if Deniz Kurtel were emerging from the fog), to the nostalgic mood dwelling in the pleasurable minimalism of "Mw Raver" (a tribute to the producer's own past), what emerges is an elusive portrait, yet perfectly realized in its parts, in which memory and present intertwine in an indissoluble relationship. Closing the record is "Polyternity", an absolute-quality deep-cut, solid on the bass and embroidered with synths, which renders the image of a New York still pulsing, alive, ready to explode as soon as its underground ferment is given full vent. Give us a club, and "Night Calling" will awaken every instinct. 

 

 

There's an old-fashioned charm to this "Currents", the charm of an era when jazz truly was a koiné shared on both sides of the Atlantic, and not just material for enthusiasts. The production is unmistakably modern and well aware of the potential of the present, but the collaborative nature and the focus on percussive patterns with a touch that occasionally brushes against lounge (an emotional shift that Junior Alli-Bialogun himself, the London-based percussionist and mind behind the JAB moniker, acknowledges) pull the whole EP into an indefinite space-time, one that touches on different contexts and eras without committing to any one specifically. That's also part of the record's success, marrying the improvised nature of early Floating Points (a declared admirer of the composer) with exquisitely fine string arrangements, hypnotic dance grooves (see the break in "Preface", after a far more languid, sleepy groove), luminous organ openings (the elegant solos on the title track, the perfect support for a nature that is awakening). The segmented flow of "Game, Set, (Checkmate)" is pure nu-jazz grace, bringing the musician's research close to the insights of Portico Quartet, but marrying them with a diffracted approach, largely indebted to certain broken-beat templates. Far removed from the conventions of the current club scene, this is a project perfectly suited to a good, close listen. 

 

 

The grooves turn deep, atmospheric, urban. The touch is velvety, the vocal samples leave a fleeting yet substantial imprint, while the basslines shift rapidly from spry funky echoes to breakbeat-adjacent flourishes. Samantha Poulter knows exactly how to move through the multifaceted dance universe of the '90s and make it her own, without caricature or oversimplification, but with the sincere devotion of someone who lives and breathes the decade to the fullest, giving back her own image of it. It's certainly a fascinating, sweeping image, never overblown, even when the touch becomes far more syncopated and imposing ("I Won't Forget"). The Australian producer steers the game with elegant assurance, works out her personal take on acid house (a "Medium" that turns the voice, finely segmented and diffracted, into rhythm and structure), rides the french-touch wave without any hesitation ("Like My Way" is a classy nocturnal number, a sparkling deep-house essay), has fun with digitized percussion and cowbells, grinding out interesting minimal progressions that the synths bathe in gleaming techno openings ("Her", almost in John Tejada territory). A fist of silk. 

 

 

This is border music, the kind found on "Ultimate Reward", which rather than excluding, annexes to itself every element it's made of and reworks them in a wholly unexpected key, as alluring as it is elusive. A debut 12" for Maara-Louisa Dunbar, this brief record works out the producer's distinctive syncretic vision, caught here investigating the borders separating techno from electro and space-ambient, only to deny those divisions and offer instead a rarefied overall view, both engaging and illusory at once. The sinister dub touches of "Der She Goes" take no time at all to reveal their alien, spatial quality, an extraterrestrial pulse that the composed vocal and detached framing render entirely foreign. And while "Splash On Mi" slows the pace, without extinguishing the distant, portent-laden aura of the previous track, it dilutes it into a more lulling, subliminal flow, one that even ventures faint fourth-world hints. "Tranquil Lust Mommy" almost invokes the astonished imagination of the best Laurel Halo, placing it though within a context of creeping electro sensuality, one that doesn't shy away from a few light hip-hop overtones. Muffled but never static, the Canadian producer's first release leaves listeners stimulated and anything but indifferent.

 

 

Between Cacola, Frogman, and other producers, Dismiss Yourself is doing everything it can to get its name properly marked on the map of the underground electronic scene that matters. If there's one other project that could pull off that feat, it's certainly Naked Flames. Young but already a prolific interpreter of the most subversive house and of techno's recombinant possibilities, with "Binc Rinse Repeat" he delivers his most solid work yet, an unstoppable 21-minute ride with no breaks or awkward transitional fades, stringing its three movements together into a single chain, a continuous flow that lets all his love of melody shine through, along with the intricate lo-fi character of the production and a deliciously satisfying sense of progression, giving the tracks just the right amount of breathing room while avoiding any sense of clutter. Full of inspired retro touches ("Relief Rinse" is packed with Eighties references, the most (video)game-like kind, carefully steering clear of any comparison to the future-funk universe), with the basslines fully underpinning the beats (edging toward dub on the more acidic title track), the EP is absorbed in a single breath and keeps revealing new details with every listen, hitting a danceable sweet spot that suits these slipper-clad times perfectly. "Waydown", with its cascades of synthetic sparks and garage overtones, rounds out an excellently composed project, one that low fidelity renders in its purest, most intriguing form. Highly recommended. 

 

 

Following in the footsteps of what she already showed on "For Lovers" and "Resonant Body", the first two chapters of a trilogy that "She's Calling" now completes, Maya Bouldry-Morrison's new project follows the path laid out by those two previous chapters, crafting a compelling blend of lush deep-house patterns (here more than ever in DJ Sprinkles territory, see the almost ambient bed underpinning "Find Your Way Home") and the raw rhythmic edge of breakbeat, used as the tracks' load-bearing frame. And it's precisely here that the sonic and conceptual thrust of the producer's recent output reaches its peak, brewing up interesting hybrids with the hip-hop sphere too (certain undercurrents in the already-mentioned "Find Your Way Home"), elaborate synthetic textures (the dream-break suggestions of "Goddess Calling"), sophisticated atmospheric structures, in which the soul finds and recognizes itself, counterbalancing the full-blooded intent of the previous two movements. Ritualistic, spiritual, yet deeply connected to a physical, bodily vision, Octo Octa's art continues to exude a lightness and a sense of wonder that not even the more muscular rhythmic approach manages to dampen. Enchanting.

 

 

And who ever said reggaeton has to be sunny, summery, laid-back music by definition? Take this EP, and every assumption you had about the genre will be sent straight to the shredder. The architect of an aggressive, dark, cavernous strain of the style, this Venezuelan producer's "perreo violento" intensifies its ties to bass music, post-industrial and jungle, across four tracks (plus two remixes) that hold nothing back in terms of nastiness and tension management. At times it almost seems like the basic pattern disappears behind the producer's heavy-handed treatments, as he fearlessly pushes the boundaries of reggaeton, hybridizing it with the unsettling revolutions of Roni Size-style drum'n'bass ("Ciudad de Dios"), giving it an atmospheric backdrop in which to let its malevolent energy simmer ("Sátira"), even toying with bhangra flourishes, almost as if the Missy Elliott of "Get Ur Freak On" wanted to throw down with the trendiest urban artists currently around ("Garganta"). In between, two remixes that are anything but half-hearted, ready to dig even deeper into the wound left open by the Caracas-based musician, from a "0212" filled out with industrial touches and vibrant micro-melodic patterns with a dancehall feel thanks to Florentino's ever-attentive ear, to a "Garganta" that AYA pushes all the way into hardcore territory, with an impetuous, propulsive touch. Simply incendiary.

 

 

There's no stopping the research of Fredrick Mwaura Njau, ever more tireless and ever more inclined to contaminate and attack whatever he's just put out, in search of new stimuli and possibilities. With "SHOTOTSU", a self-released, pay-what-you-want offering on Bandcamp, the sense of freedom of this Hakuna Mulala co-founder rides loose toward its next destination, with no inhibiting brake to slow its pace. Whether it's reformulating the traits of footwork by injecting elements borrowed from bass-music ("Worth"), or leaning the tone toward stranger ambient-juke hybrids ("Koroshimasu"), or trance-leaning experiments ("Hachiko", featuring Evian Christ and with certain Nazar foundations visible in the rearview mirror), what emerges is a curious, restless mind that succeeds no matter the field of action it chooses, the sphere it sets its sights on. And if the jungle echoes of "Tower", filtered through an almost glitch treatment, reveal anything, it's that Slikback is ready to astonish once again. Who knows what he'll do next time to get legs and neurons moving. 

 

 

Already featured in one of our previous specials, Sofia Kourtesis returns this year with a new showcase of refined house eclecticism. While the elements that made "Sarita Colonia" great remain front and center across the five tracks of "Fresia Magdalena", the compositions nonetheless know how to carry the melancholic loops of the previous project into a context that feels almost cinematic in its own way ("By Your Side"), how to play with melody without any shyness (the opening "La Perla"), how to position itself within the funk continuum, probing its recombinant possibilities through rhythmic touches that connect wildly different continents and contexts ("Nicolas"). In a project once again marked by evocations of her own life (Fresia is the producer's mother, Magdalena the Lima suburb where her family still lives), one able to speak the language of activism and storytelling even without explicit lyrical references, the EP refines the collage-like cut and emotional impact of Kourtesis's work, granting itself an intense moment of reflection in the sparkling piano work of "Juntos". Another great bullseye from an artist growing ever more interesting within contemporary house.

 

 

You can feel the passion, the dexterity in moving and manipulating the most intimate details of a genre that has known a glorious history, and which is now being rediscovered in the full extent of its expressive power. If there's one name really giving jungle a fresh shine, it's Tim Reaper, the hugely prolific London-based producer who, with this "Teletext", delivers his most vibrant, uncompromising statement yet. With breaks that force rave-culture forcefully into pandemic times, the project knows how to build tension and release it through relaxed, laid-back interludes, synth breakdowns and melodic contours that go beyond the flat monolithism of so much contemporary drum'n'bass. Euphoric, frantic when it needs to be, this quartet of tracks probes the genre's deepest recesses, finding unexpected solutions and hybridizations, progressions that don't shy away from contact with italo-disco and Eighties cosmic disco (the second half of the title track is, in this sense, the collection's most fascinating journey), and which also find room for nods to the Detroit sound, duly adjusted and revisited ("Give It 2 Me"). In this respect, the energy from the vocal samples is a plus that never grates, if anything giving the project further character, one that reveals its power listen after listen. Jungle couldn't have asked for a more ingenious ambassador.