Forget head-nodding because this is just off. Not just off the grid but off everything, like catching an eel in a barrel. Synth, bleeps, bass, drums, it’s all just bouncing off the walls on “Brun” for 30 minutes. Actually I can’t really say anything more about it than that it’s kinda like what psychedelic was for rock music, but for beats. Sortof…

If you like freaked-out beats with weird synths and samples you should try it. And even if you don’t like that you should try it anyway, even if it’s only to help me figure out if this guy is borderline genius or just plain out of his mind.

Get it for free at Bandcamp.

Suddenly changes occured, almost simultaneously. We hit our 20s, MP3 encoding became popular, old-fashioned tracker applications were replaced with midi sequencers and with the emergance of broadband internet the PC/Amiga music scene died and was reborn in the form of netlabels. I’ve never spoken to him anymore and only rarely did his name pop up on the net. People fade away, thus is life and it’s quite possible he’s forgotten all about me and the other online guys. But I have something better than pictures to remember him by: I’ve got his music.

As he and I once did over a decade ago, I now share music with you on this blog. And it doesn’t seem more than fair that I share his music with you. This is Vae a.k.a. Aleksi Virta with “Meets Torsti At The Space Lounge”.

Now Vae wasn’t revered for his skillz in a tracker as much as he was praised for his ability to put just the correct samples and grooves together in any DAW to create something incredible, a fact which is evident on this little 35 minute album which was released through Monotonik.

The ‘Outer Edge Intro’ immediately sets the tone for the album. Spaced out dubby fx, percussion and groovy drums are accompanied with a freaked-out cinematic vocal bit. ‘Nebulae Herb’ continues on the same tip, doing it’s name justice by adding a badass Hammond-like groove and a 60s space-age synth solo. If you listen closely you can hear how a wild cut-up ‘Next Level remix‘ by Show & A.G. forms the basis for this track. Crazy!

Exiting the Nebulae we find ourselves on a beach reminiscent of the Caribbean, apart from the fact that we’re on Mars. Imagine a band playing their organs and Hohners in the red sands to a Southern-American groove. When you’re done slowly swaying your hips, the ‘Gavrila Nebula’ interlude prepares you for the insane jazzyness of ‘The Giant Catch 22′. Easily a candidate for Mark Farina’s “Mushroom Jazz” compilations, this hardcore 90s instrumental hiphop track has it all: walking basslines, jazzy rides, thick beats and harsh piano hits.

After this we’re up for some serious dub (without the stepping) on “Whirlwind Pistols Dub”. Grab your dreadlock-wig from the top shelf and toke up, it’s 4:20. More instrumentalism and short solo’s on this bass-heavy track. Irie! Irie Daily! But it isn’t until Vae goes total latin on “O Tema De Viagem Especial” that he presents his grandeur. Shakers, guitars, horns, organs, drumfills, flute, xylophone, everything is just there. When you’re just getting fired up he throws in a massive funk drumbreak to totally break you loose.

With the ‘Art Of Far’ interlude Aleksi exits the party and ventures back into space, showing off some drum programming that the stutter-boys that are now hype would be jealous of. It’s just a little taste to get us in the mood for the final track, but we’re not there yet. First ‘Dragons’ must be slain on a bombastic breakbeat track which would be in A. Skillz’s top 10 if he ever heard it. If there’s another remake of Shaft, this will be the soundtrack to a heavy fighting scene.

Being almost near the end of the space journey, Vae goes DJ Krush on ‘True Dwelling Place’. Raw beats, heavy bassline and abstract pads are key. Add a little sound fx here and there and it’s done. ‘Princess Melodiae’ sounds like the title reads: beautiful but dangerous. Starting off with moody melodics the track suddenly transforms into a beat and sample mash-up that could fit perfectly in a Flying Lotus set. At the moment you’re comfortably set in that groove, the beast is unleashed and out comes a dark hard synthy breakbeat ending. Going out with a bang was never so true.

You can get the separate tracks at archive.org or download everything in the pack I’ve uploaded at MegaUpload (link updated) or zShare.

As added bonus you can check out an interview with Vae at Imaginary Planet and listen to/download a rework I did of his 2000 track ‘Beige Amme’ below.

Vae – Beige Amme (What’s That In My Sink remix)

So you like Flying Lotus, Take, Nosaj Thing, Floating Points, Dorian Concept, Daedelus, Gaslamp Killer, etc etc etc? Then you probably have already seen them live. Ofcourse that’s a blast, but wouldn’t some new names spice up the line-up of your favourite festival? Then enjoy the video’s below, download “Forget And Remember” and buy “Polyshufflez” plus the remix album. When you’re done with that, show CF some love and hassle your (local) organisers to book this guy. Madness!

Can’t really say much about this collection. It’s SirOJ, it’s a beattape, it’s chill. By now you probably know what to expect from the Slumgillion producer: minimal beats, good grooves, laidback samples and complementary synthwork.

Ok that may sound a bit boring, which this release definitely isn’t. It’s kind of an after hours space-age lounge collection throughout, with a couple of sparkling gems on it. Ranging from jazzy beats to futuristic electronics, you’ve got an hour of really decent music in 30 tracks. My personal favorites are the more downtempo’ish tracks like The Doks, Zwart ~Wit and Who’s Bringin’ It Back.

There’s a small downside to this pack, some MP3’s are in pretty low quality and the volume between tracks varies from time to time. Still, it’s free!

Check out some of the beats below (courtesy of Blunt Guts Nation) and download “Vibe Out” through zShare.

Siroj – baby dork – vibe out by BluntGutsNation

Siroj – 204 – vibeout by BluntGutsNation

Sir oj – thirty two – vibe out by BluntGutsNation

When I tried to describe the album to a friend last week, I couldn’t come up with anything else than ‘emotionally beautiful’. Now that I’ve had some time to let it sink in I’d say it sounds like Ugress meets Glitch Mob with the moodyness of Aphilas.

“Passing By Behind Your Eyes” is a very consistant album and it represents all aspects of modern music production: synthwork, sampling, drum programming and extensive composition. In stead of taking the more minimalistic approach, as a lot of hip producers do nowadays, Pretty Lights takes the complete opposite route and delivers a very layered and cinematic sound while still keeping a raw and fast-paced dancefloor edge. Don’t expect no 2-minute looped beats either, every track has a strong build-up and varied composition.

Throughout the album the workflow seems pretty straight-forward. There are groovy tight drums with a layer of nice and moody samples, which forms the froundwork for the melodic synths that are placed on top. Since the sampling isn’t the main focus but an equally important part as the rest of the composition, even the most purist sample-heads can’t front on the usage of a couple of well-known tracks (I just love how he flipped “Stretch – Why Did You Do It” on the 8th track “Let Em Know It’s Time To Go”).

Next to offering a load of releases online for free Pretty Lights also play live in a 2-man combination. Check out the video below (which is of the track with the Stretch sample)

It’s 11am, over 30 degrees celcius outside already and I’ve been rocking “Yello-21″ since I rolled out of bed about an hour ago. So that’s over 3 times in a row already.  Ba has a really nice blend of bobbin’ hip-hop beats, laid-back samples and lovely synths. All this is packed in a more analogue sound than most of the new beats that are coming out nowadays.

There’s not one track on this little gem that oozes any kind of darkness. The release is made up of a couple of full-length tracks accompanied with 1-min shortbeats, and everything just feels like a good hot summer’s day. You got sample-heavy tracks on one hand (’Intro’ and ‘Just Now’), and groovy synthloops (’Giant Clock’ and ‘Meditation’) on the other. Put this end-80bpm pack on your mp3-player, break out the speakers, grab some beers and get your ass down to the park!

Check out the intro track below, and download the soulful pack at Bandcamp for free!

Intro (Africa Get Down) by Bagir-Ba

Simon Amon (of Bathtub Piracy Recordings) teams up with Fret Hinge (the 2 men behind the boards of The Fringe, get it, get it?) and together they’ve made this incredible funky & sexy track called “Afrodisiacting”. I was pleasantly surprised because a) I had no idea Simon could sing like this, and b) I recall the production for The Fringe to be a bit more harsh and electronic.

The drum-heavy and bassline driven track is the perfect set up for Simon’s smooth vocals. The production and harmonies are plainly awesome. Broad enough to evoke an emotional response, and not too overdone that it gets a too slick rnb feel.
While the remix by Ebokai is in a total different form, bouncing simplistic beats and straight-up electronics, it’s just as sexy and groovy as the original. With the pitched-up vocals, chicago bassline and house-stabs it’s a straight-up dancefloor killer.

You can check out the tracks below, or download the package here.

Simon Amon x Fret Hinge – Afrodisiacting by Simon Amon x Fret Hinge

Simon Amon x Fret Hinge – Afrodisiacting (RMX by Ebokai) by Simon Amon x Fret Hinge

Tokyo Dawn signed yet another hot up and coming artist to their roster: Swede:art. Already known on the web for his Mondayjazz and Soundcloud sessions, the neck-breaking German electronic musician Joachim Prügl has dropped his debut album “Emotional Colors“.

If you’ve bought the last two TDR releases you know exactly what to expect: head-nodding beats, piercing synths, thoughtful raps and soulful vocalism. For some this is a reason to blindly buy Emotional Colors, for others it may be the reason to ’skip it, because I already have enough of this style’.
If you’re one of the latter persons, you need to read on. Where Comfort Fit’s “Polyshufflez” took your head all over the place with his crazy electronic bouncing beats, and Portformat’s “The Repeat Factor” brought you back to the floor with a more soulful boom-bap sound, Swede:art slides neatly in between and adds some real electro-funk in the mix.

The album has an overall chilled-out feel and the emphasis lies more on the space between the drums than on the beats itself. This space is smoothly filled with funky and thick basslines, small sample excerpts and s-s-s-s-sweeeeping synths. Next to the usual TDR suspects Blaktroniks, Caits Meissner and Comfort Fit, Swede also recruits beat-funkateers Duktus (featured on the latest Brownswood Bubblers) and Pursuit Grooves (why haven’t we done an article on her yet?).

From the staggering opening track “Black Mining” to the soulful “Linguistics” (feat. Stray) and ending with the broken beat’ish  “On My Way” (feat. Note & Duktus), Emotional Colors is a versatile release for every beat-lover.
As an added bonus you can listen to Swede:art mixing up old, new and coming TDR tracks at Mixcloud before you buy the album.

“Your favorite’s favorites of 2009″ is what Cinnaman, Shady, Brutuzz, Giographic and O.Boogie call this collection of 5 small mixes to celebrate the upcoming New Year’s eve.

Cinnaman launches off with some boom-clap beats, bleeps  and distorted arps. Fresh styles as we’re used from him, so ’nuff said. After dumping the initial boosters, Shady takes us smoothly out of orbit and into the dark void of space. From there on he slowly takes us into the dubstep nebula, where it’s time for Brutuzz to take over.

It seems Brutuzz has had enough of the endless darkness that surrounds the nebula. Ditching impulse speed he goes straight to warp 6, heading for a beautiful supernova with some blissfull 80’s electrofunk influenced stepping. While the rest of the crew is tightly strapped in, the passengers are now wiggin’ out.
After the supernova has died out Giographic relieves Brutuzz and, to make up for lost time, kicks it to warp 9 with harsh synths, steady drums and a lot of LFO’ing. Getting pushed back in your seat, the stars off the port-bow suddenly go from little white dots to bright long stripes.

Quickly entering the new constellation, it’s time for O. Boogie to explore for a suitable planet to descend to. Conducting surveys of each planet within the star system, Boogie encounters and debriefs us on everything that we’ve already heard and seen on the journey to this corner of the galaxy. Then, out of nowhere, appears a red dwarf of the likes we’ve never seen: That’s where we need to go. Setting down the spacecraft with a nostalgic tune, excitement buzzes through the ship. Everyone suits up and gets ready to depart…

…and that’s where the transmissions ended. I guess we’ll have to wait ’till next year to see what was on the planet’s surface.

Get the mix through soundcloud (MP3), mediafire (full package containing covers and flyers), or listen below.

The mix consists of the more(up) tempo oriented tracks on which Nagano is featured, making it a nice and smooth jazzy 55mins, with some touches of electronica. With all the tracks from different sources packed together it’s easy to observe how versatile Yukimi’s vocal talents are. Whether it’s trip-hop, poppy electronica or straight-up (nu-)jazz, she seems to get into the perfect vibe with ease, adjusting her way of singing perfectly to the style.

Uncle Q does a great job blending all these different tracks together into a great mix which is easy to listen and enjoy.

Tracklist:
01. Koop – Whenever There Is You
02. Ge-ology – Blues Alley
03. Little Dragon – No Love
04. Quartermaine – Mystic Qool Breeze
05. Little Dragon – After The Rain
06. Little Dragon – Feather
07. Shuya Okino – Pieces of You
08. Little Dragon – Forever
09. Koop – Summer Sun
10. Little Dragon – Thunder Love
11. Hird – Love You My Hope (Do Right Remix)
12. Swell Session – The Music in Her Eyes
13. Koop – I See A Different You
14. Jafrosax – Drawn 2 U
15. Little Dragon – Never Never

Get it here (on z-share through thecouchsessions.com)