Submerse & Resketch - Get AwayPrime garage cuts from the inmitable L2S imprint and Submerse is turning out to be something like their breakout talent - agile drum programming and luminescent, clean synthwork. You can definitely discern the jungle lineage on the title track.
Melancholy 2-step and jammin' Garrij on a future swivel from L2S's hottest prospect. Following their acclaimed 'Hold It Down' burner, 'Get Away' comes with the brooding emotional vibes (it's ok, just let it out, yeah?), whereas '2nite' features Submerse solo deploying classic samples and crisp swingers rhythms to soul-tugging effect.
http://www.M/F.com/?nm5910yz6anlhr1
Royal-T - OrangeadeButterz is a label in its infancy but it's already staked a distinct niche for itself, namely instrumental Grime production (fitting that they got Terror Danjah for their maiden release). Royal-T's been gaining a lot of heat for his remix work, and this EP shows he can be just as good hammering out originals. The title track is very, very Starkey-esque (though given Starkey's debts to Grime, maybe it's best to say he sounds like Royal-T) and only gets better as it goes along. The rest of the EP is in TD / Swindle taut Grime mode.
Certified Grime killers from the youthling Royal T, hitting up the 7th release for the very excellent Butterz label. The ruffneck and wickedly darkside-tinted 'Orangade' was apparently created after Silencer claimed Gucci Mane's 'Lemonade' was the best Grime tune at the moment, causing Southampton's 20 year old Royal T to respond in deadly style. On the flip the harder, Breaks-driven 'The Whistle Song' gets a look in, while a slickly suspended Devil mix of 'Music Please' closes the side. Rude.
http://www.M/F.com/?vg887vpq2egmx63
Baron Retif & Concepcion Perez - SupermanA curveball, this one. Authentic electronic funk, but not
computer funk, per se - the instruments all sound live / analog. Pretty cool use of synths playing traditional guitar part on the title track, smoldering spanish (?) vox on the B backed by a thick monosynth bass. The drumming is the best part here - very authentic, very jazzy. Like Helado Negro scoring a blaxploitation film.
http://www.M/F.com/?31dqbboown8zrr6
Joyride - JoyrideHeard the first 30 seconds of "Baby Soldier" and I was hooked. Indelibly arranged groove-oriented DJ music, sort of shamblotic and glitchy and definitely fast-paced but it's definitely not Low End Theory kind of stuff. The tone really jumps around a lot, too ("Afrrkk" is almost twee). Wouldn't be surprised to hear whoever this guy(s? Girl{s}?) on Planet Mu or some other "progressive" dance music label. Really incredibly strong for something that just materialized out nowhere. The more I listen, the more impressed I am.
http://www.M/F.com/?5e3dj77cb7j5pzb
Ensemble Economique - To Feel the Night As It Really IsDefinitely feeling the
Endtroducing-era DJ Shadow comparisons here - jazzy drum breaks, plaintive and moody organ and strings, building and building and building... Affecting music. Just one track, unfortunately.
Brian Pyle managed to direct two near-perfect excursions into gloomy, cinematic ambience last year with ‘Psychical’ and ‘Standing Still, Facing Forward’ and ‘To Feel The Night As It Really Is’ follows that rich seam with a wry smile. Eschewing the near-psychedelia of ‘Psychical’ and the post-classicism of ‘Standing Still…’ this five-minute piece instead takes in the dustiest of breaks and brings us something closer to early DJ Shadow, Keith Fullerton Whitman’s long-departed DJ Hekla project or a rare Trunk records basement-find. It’s fantastic stuff, and if Pyle is working on an album’s worth of this kind of material we’re really in for a treat. Don’t miss it!
http://www.M/F.com/?epyqhq577c1pe97