Mount Kimbie, Actress, Ditchdigger, Sepalcure
It’s a mere couple weeks before I make the move to New York City, so please excuse the calmness around here in light of all the last-minute projects and obligations I have been getting handled before this transition finally commences. There has been a torrent of great two-step in the last few months, here’s what I’ve been loving recently.
Mount Kimbie – Carbonated – Crooks & Lovers
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, if you haven’t heard already, is completely slaying imaginations and captivating listeners everywhere with a sound that transcends almost any genre label you try to apply to it. With their new release Crooks & Lovers on Hotflush, the UK production duo advances their sound further with a wildly catchy assortment of popping, percolating hi’s that complement without capitulating to deep, resonant, and at times even cavernous lo’s. This track might serve as the best summation of Mount Kimbie at this point in time (including remixes and live sets), but the album, which is another strong contender for release of the year in my book, encompasses ideas far to great to be conveyed through just one selection, so do yourself a favor and check this baby out!
Actress – Senorita – Splazsh
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Today’s other very strong candidate for album of the year comes from , the album is called Splazsh, and I’d be inclined to say the same genre-defying description applies to it, were it not for the fact that Darren himself has chosen a term for his sound, “R&B Concréte.” Mixing shards of R&B with an attention to engineering detail a la musique conréte, the terms UK garage and two step are hardly fitting for music that successfully conveys a sense of artistry that has become largely devoid in today’s sub-obsessed sphere of dubstep influence (I bring dubstep into this because I’ve seen Actress and Loefah share the marquee at Dub War, playing one after the other), too concerned with the worthy cause of blasting bass to imbue their songs with the feel like listeners are experiencing fine art.
Ditchdigger – douglassferns (demo)
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Earlier in the summer, I had a chance meeting with a talented unsigned producer named Joe Prewitt, out there bullying genre boundaries under the name Ditchdigger. We had a small afterparty at the crib after Plastic Fantastic/Fountain Green, playing DJ mini-set popcorn. Among the material he gave us a listen to, which spanned cold mid-tempo dub techno to more organic house blends, it all had my attention much in the same way that Floating Points and Joy Orbison did when I first heard them. Since then we’ve kept in touch, and the more we find shared musical influences from Merck to Hotflush, the more I personally get excited for what kind of tunes I will hear next. Maybe there’s more of a future in diggin’ ditches than mother warned us.
Sepalcure – Feeling That I Know So Well – (free unreleased track on rcrd.lbl)
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Prepare to hear the track that started it all for me with this Sepalcure I’ve been raving about all year. and just decided to share one of their earliest productions on RCRD.LBL blog, some free love(step) that everyone who reads Blog.H34 should have in their library. There honestly isn’t much else to say that hasn’t already been said, so just enjoy this one!
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