March Roundup

Here's White Noise's pick of the month's best tracks. Going from the biggest numbers through house, techno, and then the stranger corners of the dance spectrum, March was great and here are some highlights in our handy Youtube playlist.

Enjoy!

Remember to like White Noise on Facebook or Twitter for a daily dose of fresh tunes.

Tracklist:

Tessela - Hackney Parrot [EP Review]

Headless Ghost - Basik Fire [EP Review]

Breach - Jack [EP Review]

DEVolution - Listen To The Badman

Dusky - Dummy [EP Review]

Dark Sky - Confunktion [EP Review]

Four Tet - For These Times [LP Review]

Mørbeck - Pleasure To Burn

Florian Kupfer - Feelin

Anthony Naples - Busy Signal

Martyn - Oceania [EP Review]

DjRum - Blue On Blue (Voodoo) [LP Review]

Romare - Your Love (You Give Me Fever) [EP Review]

DJ Rashad - Let It Go [EP Review]

Deadboy - Nova [EP Review]

Shlohmo - Later [EP Review]

Bicep & Ejeca - You (Ejeca's Piano Mix)

And the one we couldn't find on Youtube, Divvorce's excellent new EP on up-and-coming NY label Fifth Wall:

Various Artists – Think And Change

Label: Nonplus

In 2011, two compilations nimbly took the stage to explore the current state of UK bass music. Hessle Audio’s 116 and Rising and Hotflush’s Back And 4^th indulged in the delights of a nebulous scene where imagination and vision were valued just as much as the ability to make an all-out banger. Two years later, Boddika takes to his Nonplus imprint, no longer a fringe-DnB portal, to offer a fresh perspective on the scene: it’s deeper and darker, every producer fashioning their sounds in Nonplus’ trademark monochrome, yet despite frequent flashes of brilliance, seems to comment on a scene whose sound is beginning to homogenise.

For the DJs, Think And Change supplies a steady stream of involving, unconventional club tracks from a selection of huge names. Joy O turns in another typically excellent game-changer in the form of the facetiously titled Big Room Tech House DJ Tool – Tip!, where an enormous, hollow bassline echoes out over an earworm vocal and his familiar dusty, shuffling drum patterns. Further afield, Pearson Sound supplies a destructive percussive workout threaded through with quavering vocals and rebounding bass notes. Quivver has all the rhythmic complexity of his latest Clutch EP on Hessle, but with the welcome addition of a vocal hook and a showstopping second drop. Meanwhile Four Tet takes an uncharacteristically straight approach with his gorgeous For These Times, where his trademark addictive vocals and acoustic samples are suppressed by a harsh snare assault pulled off to perfection. Those listening to the digital edition will also receive four extra tracks including Boddika’s VIP of his storming Mercy collaboration with Joy Orbison, a rough assault on the senses with distorting synth accents and suffocated vocal clips.

Youtube Playlist of LP Clips

For all the style of its bangers, Think And Change perhaps impresses most with its more introspective additions to the canon. Endian’s Straight Intention is a winner, deeply atmospheric house with percussive and synth additions mutating over the slightly menacing bassline. Meanwhile Lowtec and reliable experimentalist Kassem Mosse turn out some intruiging noodles, with the former’s The Rhythm (Remix 2) offering a meditative selection of softened synthwork, while the latter turns out two of the EP’s highlights with the shimmering IP Mirrors that swings like glass shards glittering in the light, and the yet more impressive Broken Patterns where a tight techno drum progression is assailed by frayed synthwork and finely treated strings. The vinyl edition's closer comes in the form of Martyn's impressively minimal Bad Chicago, an understated finale where the devil is in the details: look out for the casual touch of reverb here, the simmering synth noodles there. Yet for all the forward-thinking music on this compilation, one of the most intriguing is also the song most rooted in Nonplus’ past, the Instra:mental and dBridge collaboration White Snares, long thought to be never see the light of day. As the only track on offer that steps out of the 120-130bpm bracket, it offers a lush piece of thoughtful, stirring atmospheric DnB that shows just how far the label has come since its inception.

The fact that the vast majority of these tracks are innovative and impressive doesn’t change the fact that they are mostly cast in the same hues and crafted with the same sound pallettes. When a few stray tracks fail, say, Boddika’s Beats Me which stagnates without any real musical progression or SCB’s predictable exercise in build-and-release Dissipate, one is reminded of just how derivative the genre can become when the producers aren’t really trying something new. At least in the bass scene’s early days the missteps were more likely to be intriguing experiments that didn’t quite work, rather than me-too operations that lack a killer ingredient.  Yet ultimately one can’t criticise Nonplus for having a darkened sound pallette, and the potential stagnation of the scene shouldn’t be transposed onto the label. Think And Change remains a stellar selection of tunes with only a few missteps, showcasing Boddika’s excellent prowess as an A&R man as well as a producer, as he drafts in a formidable selection of the scene’s best and brightest who do their best twist, challenge and reincarnate the darker fringes of the bass scene as we know it.

8.5/10

February Roundup 2013

It's been a bumper month, here's White Noise's selection of Feburary's best dance singles.

Remember to follow White Noise on Facebook and Twitter to get daily doses of great tunes, old and new.

Tracklist:

Motor City Drum Ensemble - Send A Prayer Pt. 1

Leon Vynehall - Untitled 017 [EP Review]

Kyodai - The Scene [Single Review]

Garage $ale - Bump N Grind (Waze & Odyssey Mix)

Artifact - The Way It Do [EP Review]

Benjamin Damage - 010x [Album Review]

Call Super - Threshing Floor [EP Review]

Boddika & Joy Orbison - Mercy (Boddika's VIP)

Moiré - Lose It feat. Heidi Vogel [EP Review]

Powell - A Band

A Made Up Sound - Ahead [Single Review]

KH - The Track I've Been Playing...

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And here are a few other essentials we couldn't find on Youtube:

∆ ∆ - You [EP Review]

Youandewan - Disarray [EP Review]

Spare - Spare Room Offence

Jus Now - Tun Up

Enjoy!

Best Tracks of 2012: 101-76

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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It's been a big year! We'll end the festivities with a countdown of our favourite tracks of the year. All of these are great tunes, and the order is somewhere between deliberate and arbitrary, so bear that in mind. So many that got cruelly cut out of the list, but I reckon this is a solid roundup of what has been a great year for dance music. Enjoy!

 101 – MikeQ – Let It All Out 2012 feat. Jay Karan

Vogue is back.

100 – Pablo Nouvelle – Be True To Me

One of the few non-Dance tracks on here, irresistibly simple. EP Review.

99 – Four Tet – Lion (Four Tet Remix)

Huge vibes and slick atmospherics from The xx’s mastermind.

98 – Pangaea – Majestic 12

Breakneck darkness from a real master.

97 – Jimmy Edgar – Sex Drive

Just one of many brilliant moments of Edgar’s sleaze-fest.

96 – George Fitzgerald – Child

One of the year’s bounciest, most satisfying House tunes.

95 – Ejeca – Horizon

Massive House tune. It really does sound like ‘dinnertime’.

94 – Goodfoot feat Didz & The Organ Grinder

Utterly intoxicating piano House throwback from one part of CRST.

93 – Fantastic Mr Fox – Yesterday’s Fall feat. Alby Daniels

Strange, bassy, neo-pop from the inimitable Mr Fox. EP Review.

92 – Mista Men – Forget U

Muscular Garage workout from one of the UTTU crew’s very best.

91 – Body Double – Be Strong

(This is the audio for the A-side, What You Need)

Some weird House-pop from the 100% Silk camp.

90 – Jeremih - Fuck U All The Time feat. Natasha Mosley

This track was everywhere this year. Sensual, addictive, and filthy.

89 – Trikk – Jointly

One of the finest examples of the intersection between Techno and Bass. Absolutely kills on the dancefloor. Definitely big things to come from this Portuguese native. EP Review.

88 – The xx – Chained

Although Coexist was nowhere near as good as the band’s debut, this song perfectly encapsulated the powerful vibes of The xx at their best. Album Review.

87 – Maddslinky – Compuphonic

Super-stripped club track from Zed Bias, was doing the business in clubs up and down the country since its September release. EP Review.

86 – Alden Tyrell – Touch the Sky feat. Mike Dunn

Powerful Acid from a real legend coming out of the Clone camp. Top vocals.

85 – October – String Theory

Super-chilled House track from one of the scene’s unsung heroes. Totally unique, works great in the mix too. EP Review.

84 – Fracture feat. Dawn Day Night – Get Busy

Terrifyingly strong DnB / Footwork fusion that sets the floor on fire. Check out Dawn Day Night’s debut EP.

83 – TNGHT – Higher Ground

A bit too much? Definitely. Unbelievably large? Without a doubt.

82 – Shadow Child – 23

A late-December entry, this is not your average House tune. Excellent vocal build-up leads to one of the dirtiest drops this side of the New Year. Essential.

81 – 5kinandbone5 – Reset

Don’t you wish there was a button we could reset? Bassline brilliance from the UTTU camp.

80 – Funkineven & Fatima – Phoneline

Unbelievable genre-defying hybrid feat. Fatima’s gorgeous voice and Funkineven’s slick production, all from one of White Noise’s favourite labels, Eglo.

79 – Bwana – Baby Let Me Finish

Sounds like your average sugar-sweet Bass track until the percussive madness following the drop. Blissful addiction.

78 – Koreless – Lost In Tokyo

One of the Bass scene’s brightest stars only issued one release this year. It was 3 minutes long, and it wasn’t really dance music. Still, undeniably gorgeous so who really cares. EP Review.

77 – Bo Saris – She’s On Fire (Maya Jane Coles Remix)

Unexpected brilliance from one of the scene’s most consistent female producers (not nice that we have to say that, eh?) Twinkling midnight Garage, lush piano and moody vocals.

76 – Elsewhere – Trippin’

 

The darkest of the dark creeping out of your speakers from the Mindset camp. Huge, nasty, a real dancefloor killer. EP Review.

August Roundup

Although we’ve barely been treated to a summer here in England, we’ve still had a giant’s share of dance music this month. Here White Noise collects some of its favourites from the last month, give or take.

Tracklist:

Fantastic Mr Fox – Power

Citizen – Room Service

Bwana – Baby Let Me Finish

Moodymann – Why Do U Feel

Storm Queen – Let’s Make Mistakes

Dusky – Stick By This (GoldFFinch Remix)

Mala – Calle F

Blawan – Why They Hide Their Bodies Under My Garage
Visionist - Come In

A1 Bassline – Slur

Austin Cesear – Peralta Palace

Four Tet – Lion

Bobby Champs – Drag Queen

Airhead – Pyramid Lake

Holy Other – Held

Jessie Ware – Sweet Talk

White Noise will be taking a week of downtime as I'm jetting off to Dimensions festival in Croatia. Maybe I'll see some of you there. Enjoy!

Total Redraw: Home Listening Edition

Remixes that really shake things up

No self-respecting music fan is a stranger to the idea of the remix. After a track is completed, the stems are passed off to other like-minded producers and are reshaped to allow the style and personality of the remixer to come out while elements of the original are retained. While the odd remix on the B-side of an EP really shines, they can all too frequently come across as unnecessary additions to the original mixes, so when a really good remix comes about you’re sure to take notice.

This feature doesn’t focus specifically on ‘great remixes’, but rather remixes where the producer has taken the core track and has really invigorated the original track, leaving it recognisably the same but taking the tune in a totally different direction. After much ploughing through my music library, I’d like to present some of the most successful remixes I’ve heard where the remixer on hand has really gone beyond the call of duty; and these will be shown  and discussed along with the original tracks.

Running through a real range of contemporary music, a lot of these will be dance-focused but some are even stranger takes on recognisable classics alongside less well-known contributions. So without further ado, let’s get listening and check out some of the best remixes to be found in the White Noise vaults.

This two-part series will be split, with the first section dedicated to home listening tracks and the latter a big playlist of remixed dance music. Enjoy part 1!

Gold Panda – Marriage (Forest Swords 1am Hotel Room Redraw) 

In this stunning rework of one of Gold Panda’s best tunes, the atmospheric Forest Swords completely rebuilds the track from the ground up, entirely with acoustic instrumentation. The melody is still there, but it’s hard to imagine a more imaginative and successful redraw.

Efdemin – Acid Bells (Martyn’s Bittersweet Mix)

Sounding more Aphex Twin than Efdemin, legend Martyn relegates the original’s driving rhythms to the background, allowing a haunting piano melody to take centre stage.

Aphex Twin – Untitled (Four Tet Mix)

Apparently devised at the tender age of 17, Kieran Hebden’s IDM-fuelled mix of one of Aphex Twin’s most brilliant ambient tracks is a dream collaboration that retains aspects of both producers’ styles.

Mount Kimbie – Maybes (James Blake Remix)

James Blake applies a trademark warmth to one of Mount Kimbie’s best, fuzzing up the duo’s crisp production and lending it a woozy dubstep momentum.

Fever Ray – If I Had A Heart (Fuck Buttons Remix) 

Here Fuck Buttons take Fever Ray’s darkness as far as it will stretch, wielding a driving 4/4 and growling bass frequencies to create something black and wildly hypnotic.

Fever Ray – When I Grow Up (Version by Lissvik) 

Alongside for comparison, the most bizarre remix here is courtesy of one half of Balearic duo Studio, as Lissvik sets Fever Ray’s straining vocals to bouncing house with tropical synthlines. The strangest thing isn’t that it works, it’s that it works so damn well.

Star Slinger – May I Walk With You

Although not technically a remix, Star Slinger’s rework of Life Without Buildings' The Leanover is a brilliant recreation, taking Sue Tompkins’ jittery vocals to their logical extreme alongside tough beats and some of the catchiest looping you’re likely to hear.

Bibio – Lover’s Carving (Letherette Remix)

This dreamy hip hop rework of Bibio’s upbeat classic works like a charm, chopping up the vocals while retaining the sunshine of the original. The only flaw is that it’s all too short.

Lianne La Havas – Forget (Shlohmo Remix)

Shlohmo on excellent remixing form again, applying Lianne La Havas’ vocals both in original and chopped forms to a dreamy soundscapes replete with clicks, blips and deep haunting bass.

Agaric – No Way I Know I Feel  (Axel Boman Remix) – Clips of Original

Axel Boman takes Agaric’s dense original and cleans it up, making that nagging vocal the centrepiece of a world of swirling samples and twinkling beats.

Shlohmo – Rained The Whole Time (Nicolas Jaar Remix) 

The superb Nicolas Jaar livens up Shlohmo’s melancholy original with harder woodblock beats, blowing up the guitar in the original alongside soulful beats and samples that shift and swirl magnificently.

Colonel Abrams – Trapped (Hell Interface Remix)

Boards of Canada, under their Hell Interface moniker, take chopped and screwed to a new deathly extreme in their growling slow-down of Colonel Abrams’ 80s classic.

Burial – Shell of Light (Shlohmo Remix)

Tampering with Burial is not done lightly, but Shlohmo nails this one, isolating the hopeful last 30 seconds of the original and casting them onto an emotional widescreen with deeper-than-deep bass and ghostly vocal touches.

Nuyorican Soul – I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun (4 Hero Remix)

It’d be hard to outdo the original, backed by Masters of Work production and Jocelyn Brown’s honey tones, but 4 Hero turns the tune into a feelgood jazzy odyssey, thoroughly living up to the glory of the original.

March Roundup

It’s been 2012’s biggest month yet, so here’s a selection of March’s finest tunes for anyone who missed a few or needs a catch-up.

We kick off on the brighter end of Dance tracks, with some warm House and Bass courtesy of Krystal Klear, Lorca and DJ Q, as well as Aaron “Fit” Siegel’s stunning House epic Tonite. Next up Pearson Sound delivers a predictably brilliant new single and we move to darker Bass tracks from the likes of Duct and Trikk. Things get a bit frantic with Machinedrum and Om Unit’s Dream Continuum collaboration, fusing Jungle with Footwork, and Boddika keeps up the pace with his thrilling Acid Jackson. Akkord and 2562 offer a couple of deep, dark percussive workouts before Romare and Midland slow the pace with some fresh and intriguing tunes from the brilliant EPs both released last month. The final few tracks are less dance-orientated, with some excellent vocal workouts from Bondax and Doc Daneeka, all topped off by Anenon’s achingly beautiful Acquiescence.

Tracklist:

Krystal Klear – From The Start

Omar S Presents Aaron “Fit” Siegel feat. L’Renee – Tonite (Detroit Mix)

DJ Q – Brandy & Coke

Lorca – Can’t See Higher

October – String Theory

Pearson Sound – Untitled

Duct – Love Crazy

Trikk – Jointly

Dream Continuum – Giv A Lil Luv

Boddika – Acid Jackson

Akkord – The Drum

2562 – Jerash Hekwerken

Romare – Down The Line (It Takes A Number)

Midland – Tape Burn

Burial & Four Tet – Nova

Bondax – All Inside

Airhead – Wait

Doc Daneeka & Abigail Wyles – Tobyjug

Anenon - Acquiescence