Shed - The Dirt / Fluid67

Label: 50Weapons

Across many names, Berlin’s René Pawlowitz has more than earned his position as the German techno monarch. His tracks play out a resolved conflict: in equal parts subtle and pounding, oneiric and mechanised. They move irrepressibly forward yet are locked in place, building pent-up energy like jammed machinery. After an excellent recent outing under his Head High moniker, Shed now returns to Modeselektor’s 50Weapons, the label which released his latest full-length.

While Pawlowitz will often stick to one of his established styles on a release, here we’re given two different sides of Shed. The A-side, The Dirt, is a classic, as misty, detuning synths and frantic hi-hats build up to a momentous kick. It’s a rather contained affair, hypnotic rather than frenetic, yet Shed still predictably pulls it off with style. The B-side is a rather more striking affair. We’ve seen him play with breakbeats before, but Fluid67 remains a compelling composition, as rugged breaks thrash out over dubbed, aquatic synthnotes. Just as he did on the phenomenal Rave (Dirt Mix), the blend of dream-like melodics and pounding, earthy percussion makes for a winning combination, concluding Shed’s latest donation to the techno world with a bang rather than a wimper.

7.5/10

Benjamin Damage – Heliosphere

Label: 50Weapons

Benjamin Damage’s debut LP for 50Weapons, the excellent They!Live collaboration with Doc Daneeka, showed last year exactly how a dance album should be made: with care and craft, a razor-sharp eye for mood and details, and a sense of narrative coherence that still manages to evade most dance producers on their debuts. While it offered little music that could be described as revelatory, it was a confident, immensely listenable success. For his first solo outing Damage pulls off the same trick again, albeit with a stronger techno bent, offering a gorgeous album which, while it may not feel hugely innovative, martials its influences into a slick package that’s a perfect LP for the dance-heads when they’re at home.

010x

This emphasis on home-listening, providing an interesting arc for the listener to follow rather than disjointed singles, is where Damage really excels on Heliosphere. The low-key cuts outnumber the dance tracks, a selection of impressive and sonically varied atmospheric pieces which draw unlikely parallels with the likes of Boards of Canada or Luke Abbott as well as the expected references to the Berlin techno set. Opener Laika’s sunken kick and drowned snares are only an anchor to the deep ambient wash and syrupy synths that create a vibe grounded in mood rather than propulsion. Later on Light Year's colourful synths streak across a bed of increasingly aggressive percussion, filtering bass switches and dubbed-out claps building to a solid groove of hard snares and sharp synth accents that all comes together in an intoxicating fusion of styles.

Damage’s willingness to experiment with different sonic textures is the most notable success here, hear the barely-there kick and analogue hiss of album highlight Spirals which is then accentuated by a threatening acid line that becomes more viscous as the tracks wears on. The analogue sounds are continued in fine radiophonic style on follow-up End Days, where shifting synths are applied like thick treacle over a restrained set of textured percussion.

LP Clips

While They!Live showed a clear talent for combining powerful rhythms with emotive melodies, on Heliosphere Damage proves himself more than capable of tackling each independently to achieve impressive results: while the ambient cuts offer moody, hypnagogic melodies for the soul, the album’s front-end is loaded with tough rhythmic work-outs for the body. These come in several flavours: Delirium Tremens is a rugged scifi techno workout, bridging the genre’s past and present with a sure-footed knack for the groove. Penultimate track Swarm (released late last year as a single) abandons melody even further, taking shape as a Shed-referencing no-nonsense slice of big room techno. Damage’s experimentations within the area of club techno are also interesting: Extrusion takes shape as a spare, twitchty stepper, with mysterious noir chords referencing grime and the Keysound stable before a serrated android bass swipe takes centre stage.

That Damage is at his best when combining these influences is clear on the album’s excellent standout, 010x. Here a standard techno build is masterfully subverted by ringing house chords, more dream-like than euphoric, which are a natural fit for that driving 4/4. It’s an imaginative and impressive statement, as is the majority of the album. By the time the syrupy, meditative closer Heliopause is reached, the listener has been taken on a real journey by an artist with a confident voice and an uncommon ability to lend an album real narrative without resorting to drastic genre changes or surprise collaborations. Nothing on Heliosphere is going to change the face of dance music, but this is partly its charm: it remains a modest, impressively polished gem that will keep listeners coming back just to take it all in.

8/10

Best Labels of 2012

Year End Coverage

* Best Albums of 2012

* Best EPs of 2012

* Best Labels of 2012

* Best Breakthrough Artists of 2012

* Best Tracks of 2012 - 101-76
* Best Tracks of 2012 - 75-51
* Best Tracks of 2012 - 50-26
* Best Tracks of 2012 - 25-1

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In today’s climate of free downloads and disposable music, it takes more and more commitment to curate a solid label. The labels that White Noise has chosen as the year’s best are the imprints that have put out consistently excellent releases, and those that have continued to eke the best from established producers while keeping an eye out for fresh new talent.

10 – Hinge Finger

Joy Orbison - Ellipsis

Joy Orbison and Will Bankhead’s new label only put out three releases in its first year, but since a couple of those contained two of the year’s very biggest tracks, it’d be a crime to leave the oddly-named label off the list. Quality is the watchword here; gorgeous artwork and top notch mixdowns. The label-heads were similarly discerning with their releases; after Madteo’s analogue jams in Bugler Gold Pt. 1, Joy Orbison’s Ellipsis and Blawan’s His He She & She provided some hefty club tunes that had dancefloors shaking up and down the country.

Essential Releases:

Joy Orbison – Ellipsis

Blawan – His He She & She

9 – Hotflush

Jimmy Edgar – Sex Drive

Scuba’s unpredictable Hotflush imprint continued to run well ahead of the curve in 2012, with a busy release schedule offering a host of excellent releases. Although every cut wasn’t necessarily a winner, Hotflush offered a diverse and impeccably produced set of singles from the likes of Jack Dixon, Guy Andrews and Locked Groove, while stellar LPs came our way courtesy of Jimmy Edgar and Sigha.

Essential Releases:

Guy Andrews – The Wait / Hands In Mine

Jimmy Edgar – Majenta

Jack Dixon – E / Find Shelter

8 - L.I.E.S.

 

Bookworms – African Rhythms

Ron Morelli’s eclectic and uncompromising Long Island Electrical Systems label has been in action since 2010, but this was the year where it broke into the big leagues. The only common factors uniting the label’s diverse output are a taste for the rawest, darkest corners of electronic music, and Morelli has done an expert job sourcing fresh sounds from unknowns and scene stalwarts alike. Aside from the excellent American Noise compilation, special attention should go to great releases from Steve Moore, Bookworms and Legowelt.

Essential Releases:

u-202 – Straightjacket

Bookworms – Love Triangles

Various Artists – American Noise

7 – Aus

 

Bicep ft. Ejeca - You

Will Saul’s excellent Aus imprint had an uncommonly fine year in 2012, offering a series of stellar EPs from some of the House scene’s very best producers, all precision-built for the dancefloor. George Fitzgerald’s Child EP spawned two of the year’s most ubiquitous dance tunes, while Midland produced the typically classy Placement EP. Elsewhere, excellent singles showed that Cottam hasn’t lost any of his edge with another lengthy, epic house tune (Relapse), while Bicep took the focus away from 90s House to conjure one of the year’s very best with the You / Don’t EP.

Essential Releases:

Bicep – You / Don’t

George Fitzgerald – Child

Midland – Placement EP

6 – Hyperdub

Burial – Ashtray Wasp

You’d expect Kode9’s Hyperdub imprint to be losing some momentum by now, but the London-based label has continued to evolve and impress, and 2012 was one of the label’s strongest years to date. Focusing more on albums than singles, Hyperdub played the field with a wide range of successful LPs, from Dean Blunt & Inga Copeland’s career-highlight Black Is Beautiful to Cooly G’s RnB mutations on Playin’ Me to Laurel Halo’s confusing and undeniably impressive Quarantine. And that’s all without mentioning label-legend Burial, who came out with two of his best releases to date to bookend the year.

Essential Releases:

Burial – Kindred / Truant

Dean Blunt & Inga Copeland – Black Is Beautiful

Laurel Halo - Quarantine

5 - Tri Angle

oOoOO – Break Yr Heartt

Tri Angle burst out of the stables with a rare brilliance in 2011, with fantastic releases from Balam Acab, How To Dress Well, and Holy Other among others. It was certainly a hard act to follow, but Robin Carolan has kept the quality material coming, and managed to simultaneously stay true to the label’s eclectic, independent roots. This year saw great sophomore releases from Holy Other and oOoOO, an interesting debut from Hip Hop experimentalist Evian Christ and still managed to come up with one of the year’s very best albums in the form of Vessel’s searing Order of Noise LP.

Essential Releases:

Vessel – Order of Noise

Holy Other – Held

oOoOO – Our Loving Is Hurting Us

4 – Hypercolour

 

George Fitzgerald – Needs You

Hypercolour lost nothing this year by being firmly rooted on the dancefloor. The label continued to put out almost every variation possible of the House sound, continually straining against the boundaries of what we recognise as a generic 4/4 dance tune. The label had an alarming hit-rate of bangers, from Tom Demac’s terrifying Critical Distance Pt. 2 to Mosca’s Eva Mendes, by way of Huxley’s Let It Go and George Fitzgerald’s superb Needs You. Any label that can put out so many huge tunes in one year is more than deserving of a high place on this list.

Essential Releases:

Tom Demac – Critical Distance pt 2

George Fitzgerald – Needs You

Last Magpie – (Who Knows) Where Love Goes

3 – Hessle

Objekt - Cactus

The Hessle imprint, run by three of the UK scene’s biggest names (Pangaea, Pearson Sound and Ben UFO), only matches its extreme eye for idiosyncrasy with its unbelievably consistent quality. The Hessle release schedule wasn’t that full this year, but when almost every release spawned a leftfield knockout that left listeners reeling, there’s no point trying to complain. Pangaea impressed on the label’s longest EP to date with Release, while Objekt, Elgato and Bandshell provided excellent superb releases that neatly sidestep generic sounds whilst remaining dedicated to the floor.

Essential Releases:

Pangaea – Release

Elgato – Zone / Luv Zombie

Objekt – Cactus / Porcupine

2 - 50Weapons

Dark Sky - Shades

With 50Weapons Modeselektor eschew the goofiness of their releases on the Monkeytown imprint to focus on a darker strain of dance music which is even more powerful. This year the label put out an astonishing selection of LPs from most of their roster, unconventional full-lengths came courtesy of Benjamin Damage & Doc Daneeka, Shed, Addison Groove, and Bambounou among others. The range of styles is impressive but Modeselektor never let the quality drop, equally seen in a range of superb EPs from the likes of Dark Sky and A Made Up Sound.

Essential Releases:

Dark Sky – Myriam

Addison Groove – Adventures in Rainbow Country

Benjamin Damage & Doc Daneeka – They!Live

1 - Unknown To The Unknown

Palace - Trust

White Noise’s number one label is also it’s most unconventional. Unknown to the Unknown has a brilliant year that saw the coming of almost 20 releases, with no unifying aesthetic or sound to be found. Nearly all digital, UTTU’s unique brilliance can entirely be put down to the superb taste of curator DJ Haus, who birthed the label from a Youtube channel he started last year. The release schedule’s manic nature is matched only by the songs themselves, which take hyperactive swipes at everything from Electro (DJ Stingray’s unstoppable fururistic productions) to Jungle and Bassline (DJ Q’s All Junglist EP) to classic house (Capracara’s superb Ronin) to bizarre bass hybrids from 5kinandbone5, Checan and Palace. In a year where austere, industrial Techno seized the dance world by force, it’s fitting that one of the labels that shone brightest was one which threw all seriousness out of the window in search of fun tunes and dancefloor killers.

Essential Releases:

Capracara – Ronin

Mista Men – UTTU EP

5kinAndBone5 – Make U Understand / Reset

Dark Sky – Myriam

Label: 50 Weapons

London-based trio Dark Sky have managed a pretty consistent track record on their three EPs to date. There’s always been an emphasis on melody under all those propulsive rhythms, and an acute ear for detailed sound design that has steered them very well up until now. On their second outing for Modeselektor’s 50 Weapons imprint, the group get a little more intimate with that darker, more Germanic sound (fitting of the Berlin stable), and prove that not only do they keep delivering the goods, but they’re also willing to change things up.

The melodies found on the best Dark Sky tracks are noticeably absent here, as their deft skill at conjuring detailed soundfields is turned towards darker, more experimental pastures. Opener Shutter Speed kicks off into a deep, skeletal groove after a disorientating atmospheric intro comprised of boomerang bass swipes and nervy percussive accents. It finally takes shape as a lopsided roller that’s distinctly dirtier than anything the trio have put out to date, without ever sacrificing the exquisite quality of those sounds. Second cut Hequon is similarly left-field, mutating unexpectedly and resolving into an unstable, cerebral piece where every sound feels perfectly treated and applied. The second half draws comparisons with some of Hessle’s best output, as the track takes the form of a growling stepper with tight percussive twitches keeping it urgent.

EP Clips

After two impressive and notably cerebral cuts, third cut Shades opens with a fierce bass drop, clearly marking itself as the essential club cut. At eight minutes, it’s the most substantial and powerful track of the four, muscular and atmospheric without losing any of that unique polish, such as the long outro where an iridescent synth line flutters across the soundfield. Final cut Gaddagive is a stranger breed (although the trio have been known to include an oddity in previous records), a post-everything duel between grime-referencing pitchbent chimes and increasingly flexible toms, the whole track is fantastically unhinged and shows the group have a real sense of fun behind the darkness.

It’s worth pointing out that DJs might feel a little worried that there’s only one clear banger here, and the first two tracks might be felt to be lacking in punch, but these tunes more than make up for that potential loss through impeccable quality and innovative constructions. Added to this, it’s easy to see these less hook-laden cuts lighting up a dancefloor in the hands of a skilled DJ. But what are you still listening for if you can’t delight in electronic music that can still surprise you? There’s a case to be made that this is the trio’s strongest release to date; confident, immaculately crafted, and pleasingly confounding.

8.5/10