“I Look To You” is taken from Miami Horror’s debut album Illuminations released on the 20th of August via EMI. Pick up a copy at JBHIFI or iTunes.

x
Ned

Love you Russ. Really looking forward to this.

Midnight Club – August 2010.

-Mandu

The latest release from Discobelle records is remix pack of Dirty Blonde by Finland’s Femme En Fourrure.

I love everything these guys touch. Their style of minimal house is ballsy and muscular without resorting to excessive bongos.

Grindin’ native Lazaro Cassanova has given us his remix to share, but get a hold of the rest of the pack for amazing mixes from MYD, French Fries and Mad Kids.

Femme En Fourrure – Dirty Blonde (Lazaro Casanova Rhodes Mix)

Grab the full release here

-Mandu

Now, to begin: I wouldn’t say I’m a fan of minimal per se. It has its moments, sure, but a lot of the output that might well be considered the bread and butter of minimal tech has always left me feeling, well, bored as shit, really. Which I guess is what separates those genres you love with a deep and abiding passion from those about which you simply know enough of the surface layer so as to appear loosely knowledgeable should the topic come up in conversation. “Oh yes, Reginald, that Dutch house sure is everywhere. I say, have you heard the track ‘Riverside’? What a bangor!” And such. For me, minimal has generally slotted in to the latter of these categories though; a realm of electronic music that I’ve flirted with periodically but have never been sufficiently intoxicated of/around as to actually get to the point of active label recognition. Kompakt/BPitch notwithstanding, but that’d be kinda like saying you were down with electro because you knew Ed Banger.

But – and with minimal I’ve found it is a hefty but, much like Roseanne’s (ZING!… I’ll let myself out)- when it’s good, it’s really good. Really, really good. Although, that notwithstanding, I do get the feeling that the sorts of minimal I tend to find myself enamoured of are probably those varieties largely scorned by the true fan. Not for me the skittering drums and subtle permutations of a Ricardo Villalobos LP (seriously, have you listened to Thé Au Harem D’Archimedé? Masterwork or not, it’s like dance music for the sedimentary rock set), no, what I want from my minimal is a healthy dose of stately melodic fruition. The Field nailed it. Gui Boratto ain’t half bad either. And now British newcomer Max Cooper is making a steady tilt at this maxed-out-minimal throne. Yep. He’s all like Simba from the Lion King taking down Scar with a drum machine and classical sensibilities.

Max’s music is exactly what you expect from a producer operating in the field – subtle, affecting, massively pretentious – but there’s still something immediate and raw about a lot of his output. These tracks somehow manage to be both melancholy and propulsive at the same time; they’re introspective but built to party, much like a chubby teenager in a Hawaiian shirt jacked up on bourbon and unleashed on an unsuspecting public… God, now there’s a night I wouldn’t want to remember even if I could. Yikes. Quite unlike that evening, Cooper’s techno is deep, moving, precise and filled with a compelling, dark energy. Which is to say, the tracks unfurl slowly, spending their first half inching ever on toward a state of sonic immensity before cresting the breakdown and suddenly dropping in to a resurgent bass thrum and nostalgia-ridden melody line that I could imagine tearing the living emotion out of your average 6 am Berghain punter. There would be tears and everything. They’re also produced with an eye for detail and texture that could perhaps be labelled ‘symphonic’, although maybe that’s just an overblown way of saying he uses strings an’ shit. Nonetheless, Cooper has recently finished up a remix for Michael Nyman, which I do feel goes some way toward shoring up his orchestral credentials. Of course the man has produced his share of more straight up tech offerings too, but I’ve found that even those seem somehow more compelling by contrast with the rest of his output.

But, really, all of that is three paragraphs of needlessly waffly prose to just say one thing: Max Cooper makes beautiful, hypnotic techno that should be listened to by anybody with even a passing interest in intelligently geared dance music. Now, with that out of the way, get it in ya’

Domink Eulberg – Daten Ubertragungs Kusschen (Max Cooper Mix)

Max Cooper – The End Of Reason

Portishead – Roads (Max Cooper Remix)

And because it was the first track of Max’s that I was exposed to, and potentially still the best, his just released remix of Hot Chip’s ‘I Feel Better’ is fucking superlative and should be listened to by absolutely everybody.

His tracks are all over Beatport, Juno, iTunes, et al, so go, explore, purchase and make Max Cooper a part of your life.

[Image courtesy of glass magazine]

Internet speed, water conservation, immigration policy, supergroups. Australia struggles to compete with the UK in many areas. Between The Wrights, Basement Birds and the Hey Hey It’s Saturday house band, we haven’t got much international chop in the latter department.

If you live in the UK however….

Magnetic Man are about as big in the game as you can get. From the sound of the it they’re aiming to crossover big time in the near future. More dubstep in cafes can’t be a bad thing!

I Need Air is out July 25th.

Magnetic Man – I Need Air (Redlight Remix)

Magnetic Man – MAD

-Mandu

It’s kind of bizarre to me that the original version of this was kicking around over 12 months ago and it still hasn’t been properly released yet. There are shrews whose entire life span is shorter than that. You could have watched the clip with a shrew when it was first uploaded to YouTube and told it, “You will literally die before this gets released.”

But regardless, HURTS are finally releasing their second single on August 16th with remixes from Arthur Baker and Mantronix. ‘Wonderful Life’ is cold, calculated, and instantly polarising, but it’s also an enviably slick piece of pop.

HURTS – Wonderful Life (Mantronix Remix)

- bec

One of the amazing jams from Joakim’s ‘Bazzouka Edits’ release, a lounge-dwelling romp through Wing’s ‘Let Em In’.

Paul McCartney – Let Em In (Jimi Bazzouka Edit) 192kbs

Joakim upped this on his Soundcloud account – i’ve transcoded it down, so if you want the full 320 action head there.

The full white-label has a groovy rendition of The Rolling Stone’s first foray into disco – ‘Hot Stuff’. Grab the full release here

And thanks to COBBBOOO for the spotting this.

-Mandu

I can’t say I really dig breakbeat or any of the various bastardisations of drum and bass that seem so popular in Perth, Adelaide, New Zealand and smelly people’s houses.

I’ve had dalliances with Way Out West, and Luke’s been schooling me in the art of High Contrast (which has been very pleasant). Pendulum weren’t very nice when I interviewed them, so they can jump in a hole (and remix it badly) for all I care.

But here’s something on that tip really worth sharing – deviant, cheeky, bass ripping tunes from Melbourne. Opiuo has been on the forefront of Melbourne’s electronic fringe for years now. His debut album is around the corner.

The generous soul has decided to give away his whole Physical Symptoms EP for free from Bandcamp, so jump over there now and gorge yourself on some upsettingly glitched out bass musik.

Here’s my favourite jam

Opiuo – The Freaky Bean

-Mandu

The OG just got dropped our way. Further evidence of Gypsy and the Cat’s looming largeness in the game.

Going to be a big year for these boys when they get back to Australia..

What do you think? Have you checked out the remixes yet?

Grab the 7″ single from Young and Lost Club right now

Gypsy and the Cat – Time To Wander

-Mandu

Levins and Nina – the kind musical souls behind the Heaps Decent outreach programs, have shot us a new track from one of their sessions at a NSW detention centre.

Produced by the one and only A-Trak, this jam features young, institutionalised Australians venting real frustrations through rap. Once you get past the obvious ‘home-taping’ style, one can’t help but be moved by the stark realities facing young indigenous people who, through misadventure or lack of education and opportunity, find themselves swept into the grind of Australia’s justice system.

So have a listen (because it’s A-Trak and he’s uber-dope), then have another listen while reading up on the rest of Heaps Decent’s work over here

Heaps Decent – Anywhere But Here