Gold Panda – Lucky Shiner

Originally hailing from Chelmsford, Essex, Gold Panda is in good company – the town has produced a fair few impressive electronic musicians over the years, including The Prodigy and Squarepusher. Perhaps the Essex mentality adheres to creativity; this album is a clear indication that Gold Panda has a bright future ahead of him.

Being relatively new to the scene, GP spent the early part of last year building a reputation with superb remixes for the likes of Little Boots, Telepathe, Bloc Party, Simian Mobile Disco, Health and The Field. He has since gone on to release three EPs of his own material, live performances soon followed and his invigorated head-hunched style quickly established him as an electronic artist who can really play live.

This debut album is an excellent piece of work – taking on board a huge array of influences, including everything from hip-hop to minimal techno and creating an all encompassing atmosphere. It’s kind of hard to put your finger on why but the album oozes a Japanese vibe right from the offset: clearly Gold Panda has been heavily influenced by his two years spent in the country learning the language.

The opener, You, kicks things off with a heavily sample based hip-hop vibe that feels similar to the down-tempo, bassy electronica currently in vogue due to works from the likes of Mount Kimbie and James Blake. Vanilla on the other hand instantly takes a different route – harking back to old house and techno rythms; with head nodding lead stabs and…

Read the full review at Data Transmission…

Adventures in Dubstep and Beyond

Ministry of Sound aren’t exactly known for their risk-taking and forward-thinking approach when it comes to compilations, or even nights, however this new comp is a real breath of fresh air. Although things are getting better the scene is still plagued by obvious compilation packages put out to satisfy the never-ending stream of dubstep converts who want nothing but the biggest wobble tunes and ‘classics’ from over a year ago. But the tracklist for Adventures in Dubstep and Beyond instantly offers up something different. With tracks from the more underground and relatively unknown producers like Sully and VVV, this compilation brings together styles from across the bass music spectrum. Elements of house, 2-step, dubstep and garage are all expertly chosen and mixed by Joe Muggs.

The first disk offers up a superb collection of garage influenced bass; tracks which are going to be appealing to the more knowledgeable heads as well as those getting their first taste of the new dubstep mutations currently at the forefront. Highlights include the excellent opener; Ikonika’s remix of the Night Slugs anthem The Only Way Up from Egyptrixx, the outstanding garage goodness of Svpreme Fiend’s Downfall and El-B’s This Thrill. The 2-step bangers are coupled with some more familiar hits of dubstep, like the collab between Benga & Goldilocks on Green Eyes and Fused Forces’ What’s Goin Down. These tracks may be on slightly more recognizable ground but Joe Muggs has definitely maintained a sense of the underground and not…

Read the full review at Data Transmission…

Skream – Outside The Box (Tempa)

One of the first records that really got me hooked on all things Dubstep was Skream’s debut – Skream! This album was unlike anything I had heard before, and coupled with Burial’s debut I’d sight it as having a seriously significant effect on my musical tastes from that moment onwards. Since the first album I, and many others, have eagerly anticipated the follow up. It’s been four years in the making and has a lot to live up to.

So when I received a copy of ‘Outside The Box’ I was pretty excited to see what Skream had delivered. Unfortunately, as a whole, I have to say that I’ve been a little disappointed with the results. Don’t get me wrong there are some amazing tracks on ‘Outside The Box’, it’s just that on first listen the album doesn’t deliver the same heavy impact felt on the debut. This might in part be due to the move away from the reggae dub feel of the first album, making use of collabs with artists like Warrior Queen, and towards a more commercially viable sound, collaborating with La Roux and Murs.

I’ve heard that Skream aimed to bring the ‘rave’ back to UK dance music, so with this new album he takes on influences from the sound of those infamous illegal parties of the early 90’s held under the London’s orbital. Throughout the album you do get those characteristic ‘hands in the air’ moments and you do get a definite feel of what Skream is trying to accomplish, it’s just that it doesn’t seem to quite work.

Looking at individual tracks it’s obvious that Skream is an amazing producer, the quality of each track and the way they’re crafted is second to none. The opening of ‘Perferated’ is genuinely epic, it’s a big synth filled track with no beat and most definitely gets your juices flowing for the body of tracks to follow. The second tune ‘8 Bit Baby’, which features American rapper Murs, doesn’t follow on from the opener in the same impressive way. It simply feels lacking in emotion, if the aim is to ‘get ravey’ this track doesn’t fit the bill.

I don’t want it to seem as though I don’t like the album, because I genuinely do. There are some really stand out tracks that can be listened to again and again with ease. ‘How Real’ is a definite highlight, the computerised vocal and up-tempo beat coupled with the building of tension had me dancing round the room. Other highlights include ‘Listening To Records On My Wall’, taking a classic jungle break and transforming it to fit the rave-heavy feel of the album, and the absolutely stunning ‘A Song For Lenny’, a grand orchestral piece of music which undoubtedly had a lot poured into it. Skream closes the album with ‘The Epic Last Song’, another nod to classic jungle which really does what it says on the tin.

As a whole the album should be approached as a record to be listened to at home, in the car, on the bus etc…It’s not an album of club bangers, the notable exception in that case being ‘Wibbler’, the tracks are skilfully put together and the production quality on each one shines through. The goal that Skream had in mind when putting ‘Outside The Box’ is evidently clear – to create an epic journey taking on board the past sounds that have really influenced him, I just can’t help feeling that all in all the album falls short.

Originally published in Data Transmission on 09/08/10

Mount Kimbie – Crooks & Lovers (Hotflush)

This highly anticipated debut album from Mount Kimbie has been surrounded by an unprecedented amount of hype, and deservedly so. The duo’s renowned live shows and consistently impressive forward thinking releases have earned them a reputation as a powerhouse of producing amazing music. With this in mind anyone with prior knowledge of MountKimbie will be approaching the album for the first time with undoubtedly high expectations, and luckily for us all the release definitely not a disappointment.

When listening to Crooks & Lovers all that springs to mind is ‘beautiful’; each track is expertly crafted to take you on a journey of awe-inspiring electronica. The opening track ‘Tunnel Vision’ offers up a brief but nonetheless beautiful intro and is followed up by the melodic and upbeatness of ‘Would I Know’, both of which submerse you into a world of subtle manipulations and pitched up vocals.

The album moves forward with the chopped up vocals and guitar fuelled ‘Before I Move Off’ with a real genre defying feel, things take a turn for the darker with ‘Blind Night Errand’ which echoes a sparse down-tempo garage vibe and errs on the side of the current bass-fuelled London scene. At only a minute and a half the fifth track from the album, ‘Adriatic’, is a kind of break from the main body of tracks, it’s a melodic guitar-lead down-tempo number and again features chopped up vocals and samples.

‘Carbonated’ is an eerie track with subtle percussive elements and a vocal which seems highly reminiscent of some kind of ’90s garage tune, the blend of the vocal and the light woodblock hits eludes to the track dropping into something more but it never crosses the threshold. The next tracks ‘Ruby’ and ‘Ode to Bear’ move in a slightly different direction with Ruby taking on a more dubstep feel and ‘Ode to Bear’ seemingly infusing elements of electronica and idm whilst they both maintain the overall sonic atmosphere created by the album.

The album yet again changes pace with ‘Field’ beginning with a pumping rhythm which is a little more on the harder side of things than the tracks up to this point, it then drops into a guitar riff which wouldn’t be out of place in a modern indie band’s repertoire. Next up is ‘Mayor’, a really sparse melodic track featuring nothing more than the melodic plucking of guitar strings, a rhythmic clap and a subtle vocal sample. The album closes with Mayor – an upbeat track with interesting rhythmic elements, synth work and more chopped up vocal samples, it’s one of the many stand out tracks from the album and is a great a finish to an amazing debut LP.

If you’re into the forward-thinking bass movement and intellectual dance music, then Crooks & Lovers is a must have.

Originally published at www.datatransmission.co.uk on 26/07/10

Lorn – Nothing Else (Brainfeeder)

Having remixed the latest single from Jammer and in doing so showcased his dark and brutal talent for sub-bass filled dubstep, Lorn is an artist fully deserving of this full length debut album.

Lorn is the only member of Flying Lotus’ Brainfeeder imprint to not come from LA, and he in fact describes his hometown as, “the middle of nowhere in Illinois”, perhaps this isolated upbringing has had an effect of the music this 23 year old creates. Lorn’s music is consistently epic and full of melancholic tones, with the ‘Nothing Else’ album again delivering and living up to this intense sense of atmosphere.

The first track instantly propels us into another world with drawn out sounds and an intriguing sonic feel, then we’re dropped into an all encompassing angry and future feeling hip hop beat characteristic of the crew from across the pond. As the album continues we are taken on a dark journey through the twists and turns of tracks like ‘Nothing Else’ which has an eerie kind of fairground or circus feel to it, or the brutally sad and atmospheric ‘Army of Fear’ which resembles some kind of military war-cry.  The sonic adventure continues with a continued eerie and epic vibe which is increasingly difficult not to become absolutely immersed in, the fifth track ‘Automation’ is an assault on the senses sheer unadulterated bass and ‘Void 1’ and 2 are like some kind of hard edged video game sound track that has been given a good treatment of glitch.

The second half of the album maintains a deep, deep dark sense of ambience with the woozy synths and powerful bass of ‘Tomorrow’ and the morose beauty of ‘Glass & Silver’ drawing us further and further into Lorn’s shadowy world. Things could be said to move into a slightly different gear with the electro-infused, deconstructed hip hop of ‘Greatest Silence’. The album is completed with ‘What’s The Use’, which for a reason that I struggle to pinpoint actually delivers a somewhat extraordinarily unexpected uplifting feel, even the ghostly vocals add to this amazing finale which undoubtedly completes a superb album.

I can only speculate as to the inspirations that Lorn has drawn on to create such a piece of work. It’s an uncompromising achievement which provides the listener with an uncensored insight into an extremely talent artist and his creativity. ‘Nothing Else’ is electronic music full to the brim with raw, real emotional energy which touches the listener and once felt it’s hard to forget.

Originally published at datatransmission.co.uk on 08/06/10