thirsty thursday techno

it is thursday evening (somewhere-near-chicago time), i am drinking beer and listening to these tunes.

giorgio gigli - kana broadcast 025 as usual, giorgio comes through with the goods, in the form of a deep techno session that just barely simmers above 120bpm. delicious! and a short but abstract interview piece as well.

shifted - dj set - unsichtbar 10 12 11 pitching things up to club tempo, dig this three-hour recording of shifted in action in mannheim germany in december. this one kicks into gear with a recent cio d'or track on prologue - a pleasant way to slip into a few hours of techno madness. sadly, this one is stream-only for now; the alternate download link is now gone because my fair government decided to take down megaupload.

TR-101 - RA.292 quick! only a few days to grab this before it's archived. here's dj pete and sleeparchive in action as TR-101, live at berghain in berlin. expect raw, rolling beats and plenty of bleeps and other sci-fi intangibles, and hold on to your butts. one of RA's best techno 'casts since O/V/R's effort last year. now if only some of this stuff was put to vinyl...

northern structures - TEA podcast #17 i've been following this denmark duo since their first EP dropped on sonic groove just about a year ago. this is an ableton mix done right, bunching together tons of percussive bits into a tough hour of power... and it comes with a nice extended interview with the two artists about their connections with sonic groove (which has definitely been on a roll lately) and their approach to live jams. northern structures is definitely worth keeping an eye on.

okay, that's it for now. obviously, i'm in a techno mood. and i know some of these are a bit 'old' (well, not really) but i take my time listening to mixes and the six hours of stuff here has gotten plenty of repeats in my soundsystem over the past few weeks. so, enjoy!

thursday night mixes?

yes - thursday (late) night mixes!

clr podcast 070 - edit-select
another great clr techno podcast. this set rides a steady, driving, upward gradient that sets up an ultimately glorious meltdown. don't mind chris liebing's ever-optimistic interludes - this mix burns relentlessly. check that last track: a new ZAltd single by giorgio gigli, obtane, and nax_acid. scroll down a bit to find the tracklist here.

wax treatment podcast #011 - dj pete
dj pete serves up another helping of deep, intelligent dubstep sounds. not much else to say other than the guy has great track selection with a nice mix of aggressive grooves and gorgeous melodies. check the tracklist here.

RA podcast 212 - elektro guzzi
this is a pleasant surprise: a 'rock' power trio - guitarist, bassist, drummer - performing live techno. i had never heard of elektro guzzi before but this is very interesting. i'm really impressed at how tight the band is, each allowing the other time to really get spaced out before getting back to the beat... all in all, this is some pretty dark stuff. clocking in at 50 minutes, it sounds great on its own but i do wish it were (much!) longer. i would very much like to see this band perform live...


listen and learn!

monday night mixes

summer is drawing near! with temperatures here in chicago expected to reach the 70s in a few days, perhaps a few sets of some sexy sunny tech-house in order... as well as a slamming set of hard techno to bring us back to the reality that it's still just the end of march and temps are still in the 30s here in the windy city...

martinez - live at 'save the day' off sonar, barcelona, 2009
one of those sets that i should have seen while i was in barcelona... alas, i was getting a few hours of sleep and meeting up with a friend before arriving at this party later. 'save the day' was a party in a big rented-out room in a mall with balconies overlooking barcelona harbor, showcasing matthias tanzmann and some of his moon harbour label friends... the slow-burning beats of this afternoon set seem like it made an excellent warmup for the higher-intensity sets later that night. while i'm not completely familiar with martinez's work, it's interesting to contrast this and late 2008's organic theme EP with his LP from late 2007, a chemical imbalance, which definitely seems to cater to the then-in vogue style of 'minimal techno'. anyhoo, this isn't anything spectacular, just a nice mellow hour of low-bpm grooves.

argenis brito - 2009-8-22 barcelona live PA
another set from barcelona last year but later in the summer. argenis brito has a small portfolio of edm releases, perhaps most notably on luciano's cadenza label... so if you like luciano and his brand of lush, tribal-esque dance music, you'll probably dig this. lots of interesting cut-up vocals and horn samples... a bit more peak-time, with some intense break-downs. funky and fun!

seth troxler - 2009-12-26 boxing night, belfast

it's seth, you should know what's up. if not... well get a clue and check this out. fun, emotional, weird... all put together with excellent mixing skills. go seth!

sleeparchive vs dj pete - 2007-02-03 @ club transmediale
a master of bleeping, looping electronics + one of the founding fathers of dub techno = two hours of unrelenting techno destruction! i'm honestly not quite sure if this is both sleeparchive and dj pete (it might just be sleeparchive, according to one source, and indeed there are some sleeparchive tracks sprinkled throughout), but i do know both these musicians occasionally dj together. regardless, this is *the shit*. this mix starts off a bit weird and disorienting, but be patient: this develops a razor-sharp edge, fast and hard-hitting. if you can keep with it, this mix should burn holes in your face. i don't need to dig up a picture to accompany this one... just do it!

so there you go - a few dashes of summery beats, and a techno bullet-train aimed straight at your forehead. get to it!

late night jams

staying in tonight, so let's see what we can hear...

audion - minitek 2008 livePA
matthew dear performing a live set at new york city's minitek festival in september 2008. while the rookie festival received mixed reviews at best, at least we got a few quality recordings from the experience. here matthew does a razor-sharp set as audion, nailing his noisy melodies and chopped-up, effected vocal samples to a pummeling 4/4 beat. abrasive, yet hypnotic.

dj pete - wax treatment podcast #006
dj pete, aka substance and one-half of scion, was a part of the chain reaction label/collective of dub-techno founding fathers. for this podcast series, he takes on dubstep and other bass-heavy sounds, with excellent results. podcast #006 is especially intense, with tight mixing and wave after wave of truly deep dubstep. check out the podcast page for more mixes and tracklists.

simon flower - melbourne deepcast 006
another 006, but this one's not nearly as tense... and comes courtesy of a neat mix series from australia. the aim is to allow the guest mixers space to get deep and do something interesting, and i think simon flower does that here. the new zealander has produced tracks for moon harbour and poker flat (appearing on steve bug's album collaboratory from last year); for this mix, he uses a choice collection of atmospheric yet danceable tracks. nice and hazy: i dig it... check out the melbourne deepcast blog for more information, a tracklist, and other intriguing mixes.

i'm still not dead, here's still some more mixes!

happy last day of the first decade of the second millennium (i think). i've been too busy to focus on writing lately but i've been enjoying some delicious mixes lately. here's some:

dasha rush - mnml ssgs mx40: intense vertical and sleepless horizontal
another gem from mnml ssgs... i had never heard of dasha rush before listening to these mixes, but since that first listen i've been keen to check out her sound and her record label, fullpanda. there are actually two parts to this mix: 'intense vertical' aptly describes the 80 minutes or so of deep, driving, atmospheric techno... i've already listened to this all the way through a number of times and it is lovely. 'sleepless horizontal' is a bit more... experimental. dasha takes a spoken-word text and layers it with ambient soundscapes. the musical backing provides an interesting context for the story; definitely an intriguing 'read.' check out the ssgs blog for more info and tracklisting.

suspect - live set, june 2007 paris
found out about this guy by looking up the fullpanda label and its team of producers. even though this is more than two years old, to me it really exhibits a bit of a timeless quality. it's only a half-hour long, but it definitely sounds like it would fit in with dasha rush and her label: more intense techno with disorienting melodies. check out his website for more information and a bunch of free tracks (which i've admittedly not scrutinized yet).

scion - dj set at nightgroove 2001
not really sure what the origin of this is and the sound quality is average at best, but who cares when it's this good. scion is substance and vainqueur, two parts of the chain reaction collective and some of the original purveyors of dub techno, so it makes sense that these guys would have an amazing collection of tracks to work with. this mix goes all over the place, and sometimes the transitions between different tracks and moods is pretty rough, but really, the track selection is stellar. the mix usually goes back and forth between hypnotic, dubby house/techno and more 'authentic' dub tracks filled with effects. did i say these tracks are fucking amazing? definitely worth a late-night listen. check an incomplete tracklisting here.

ok, that's it for now: three (well, technically four) mixes to bite into; all will require a bit of patience but it will be rewarded. i hope to discuss my thoughts regarding electronic dance music in 2009, including some of my favorite releases and whatnot... but until then, enjoy these mixes and happy new year!