Terrorball's No Panzers No Peace

I’ve been following the work of Hamilton electro producer Terrorball (aka Gareth Pemberton) for a number of years. Over the past decade he’s been relatively prolific in releasing stuff on platforms like Soundcloud and Bandcamp. Not only his own original work but also edits and reworks of other material. Most of it issued as either a free download or as a name-your-price release. In 2016, he was even kind enough to help fill in a few gaps for us when completing a short Q & A for the blog (here).

The latest Terrorball work, No Panzers No Peace, was released online earlier this month and it’s one of his best efforts yet. It's mostly the tried and trusted hybrid of electro-funk and disco, but in the form of tracks like ‘Goblins’ and closer ‘Daydream’, there are perhaps a few surprises on offer for those familiar with past Terrorball output. Not least for the way they deviate into a far more reflective or melancholic guitar-pop realm. Check it out by streaming or downloading below:

Bending Spoons

I always get a little nervous when I'm sent new music from bands or artists I've never heard of. Often my natural inclination toward cynicism is right on the money, and on other occasions I'm pleasantly surprised with what I find when I investigate further. Last weekend, brand new local band Cricket Farm sent me an mp3 copy of their debut track, Bending Spoons, which I was thrilled to discover, and it falls rather comfortably into the latter category. So much so, I thought it was well worth sharing here. Which I guess is the whole point of them sending it. It's a quite lovely slice of soft acoustic folk, with a sweet vocal from Hayley Robertson, and just a hint of humour right at its core. And yes, it does feature a guy playing spoons ... check it out on the band's Soundcloud page here.

Album Review: Thriakis Dub Destroyer - The Galactic Journey (2016)

While web label Original Dub Gathering (aka Ondubground, or ODGProd, depending on where you look) describe the Paris-based Thriakis Dub Destroyer as "one man dub", it's clear the artist himself does his best work when involving others in a collaborative process. At least that's the case so far as his latest release, The Galactic Journey, is concerned.

The Galactic Journey, a follow-up to 2013's Cosmic Dub Monster and 2014's Space Dub Signals, is an 11-track trip into the murky netherworlds of electro and digi-dub, in the spirit of past blog favourites like Panda Dub, Art-X, and to a lesser extent, Radikal Guru.

Highlights include collaborations with fellow space travellers Sensi T (‘Faya Ago Bun Dem’) and Rebel I (‘Ganga Spirit’), but infectious opener ‘Running The Line’ is probably the best thing here. The album is available as a free download (and/or via donation) on the Original Dub Gathering website, via Soundcloud, grab a copy of it below:

Thriakis Dub Destroyer free download (click here)

The Festive Dozen 2015: Nicolas Haelg - Seduction Magnet

I really love it when old musical genres are given fancy new threads to wear. Especially when it results in something of a minor rebirth within that genre. In the last few years, that last bastion of the nightclub scoundrel, disco, has to one extent or another been given a new lease of life thanks to the emergence in clubs of a sub-genre called deep house.

It has a slower tempo (in terms of bpm) than house and most forms of what we might loosely call techno, but it’s bass-driven and usually relies on a funky guitar hook or riff to make those knees twitch. That’s a classic disco trick, as perfected over time by funk guitarists like Nile Rodgers, Bobby Womack, and Eddie Hazel, among many others. It’s the sound of Chic, Sister Sledge, Parliament, and more recently, Daft Punk. I think it’s something most people just feel, rather than hear, so please excuse my rather awkward attempt to describe it.

It’s also something that featured a lot in the work of a guy called Nicolas Haelg, a Switzerland-based producer who was prolific in his output and commitment to deep house throughout 2015. It seemed like every six weeks or so throughout the year, Haelg had a brand new track up on his Soundcloud page – usually free to download – either collaboratively or under his own name in a solo guise.

This is really just disco under another name, produced by a young guy whose parents would barely have been old enough to embrace the original sound the first time around. It’s the sound of New York 1975-1979, of mirror-balls, of glitter, and of sequin smoking jackets. Haelg’s brand of funk is so much of a throwback you can practically smell the amyl nitrate as it gets passed across the dancefloor ... okay, so I’m getting a little bit carried away, but you get the picture.

In short, and to get to my typically long-winded point, Nicolas Haelg might just about be the funkiest white guy on the planet right now, and one of his earliest bangers of 2015 was ‘Seduction Magnet’ … check it out:

(The Festive Dozen is a fairly randomly selected year-end collection of clips featuring the tunes which featured most prominently on the (generally pop-loving) iPod playlists of everythingsgonegreen at various stages throughout 2015) ...

 

Albums of 2012 # 1: Celt Islam – Baghdad

When I was posting a short series of ‘Just Browsing’ posts to highlight a few of my own favourite downloading sources a while back, I had fully intended to include Celt Islam’s Soundcloud page but never quite got around to it. Here’s a guy with virtually no commercial profile whatsoever, yet he’s making some of the best electro-dub-world crossover tracks you’re ever likely to hear. He calls it Sufi Dub, and he gives most of it away.

Celt Islam (aka Muhammad Abdullah Hamzah) is a Manchester-based composer and producer with an extraordinary talent, and the album Baghdad – released digitally in late 2011 – is perhaps the ultimate example of his widescreen musical vision thus far.

 

I say widescreen, yet ironically it is probably only the niche market appeal of his work that has held him back from wider acclaim. I suspect some of this stuff is not all that accessible to an awful lot of people, a situation not helped by the limited marketing scope of a self released album.

But it’s widescreen in the sense that it blends so many different genres to produce something of a genuine world music hybrid. No single style dominates an absorbing mix of dub, electro, drum’n’bass, and dubstep, with African flavours and Middle Eastern influences being the most prominent.

I picked up my copy of Baghdad mid-year, having previously compiled a pick and mix playlist of some of his earlier output. It blows me away every time I listen to it. So much so, it soon became the irresistible and only option when it came to selecting my number one album of the year. I can’t say for sure that it was my “most listened to”, but it is the one that made the most impact on me.

 

It somehow all feels very international, very global. The absence of vocals (for the most part) probably helps. I don’t really know whether having some sort of global vision is a key philosophy behind Sufi Dub, but it feels good. It feels like it connects a wide range of musical strands, something that’s open to all colour and creed, just patiently waiting to be embraced as a theological and meditative blueprint for a better world.

At a time when global unity feels like a forlorn hope – even if it remains every bit the main ideal we should all aspire to – Baghdad offers a brief reprieve from concepts like xenophobia and ethnic difference. A journey across a border-less world, no less.

If only more people knew about it.

Highlights: ‘Tribernetikz’, ‘The Silk Road’, ‘Sarayda Dub’ (clip below), ‘Presence’, and ‘Sinking Sand’.

 

 

 

Free Stuff: XLR8R and Radikal Guru

XLR8R magazine’s web equivalent has long been a great source for some of the best “dance” and electronic music downloads out there. In fact, the site offers so much more than that, but in terms of putting new stuff online and available for free downloading, XLR8R in my opinion remains the most reliable option when it comes to consistency and quality. Plus it’s easy to use.

It isn’t for everyone, XLR8R tends to veer on the side of bass music and more experimental genres within the wider dance music sphere, but that’s what gives it a significant point of difference. And it also means exposure is given to artists you wouldn’t normally hear on the radio or on some of the more mainstream dance music compilations.  

As is customary at this time of year, ‘best of’ and ‘worst of’ lists for the calendar year are being compiled everywhere and naturally XLR8R has compiled its own list of the site’s top 100 downloads for 2012. And of course, it’s free, in the form of a zip file found at the foot of this link.

 

***

Radikal Guru is a remarkable artist. I was blown away by last year’s The Rootstepa album and rated it as my number one (or most listened to) album of 2011. This year he’s been less prolific with recorded output, but has remained active as an increasingly relevant live/touring performer.

 

Over at Soundcloud, here’s a couple of brand skanking new free downloads from the man himself … just in:

 

Radikal Guru - 10 Ton Dub and Elephant Dub

 

 

 

Just Browsing: Free stuff on Soundcloud ... Part Five: Dub Terminator

Dub Terminator is Auckland-based Chris McLay, a DJ/producer of some renown locally, but also a man very much in demand internationally when it comes to his remix and production work.

Dub Terminator has collaborated with a virtual who’s who of the international dub scene over the course of the past three years or so – whether he’s been applying production gloss to any number of earthy roots dubplates, or producing stuff with a more in-the-moment stepper-style twist, DT’s ability to transcend genres is the key to much of his prolific output. Most of which is already out there and available for free on Soundcloud (in fact, a range of sites).

In 2011, Dub Terminator’s ‘Big Up Riddim’ hit No.1 on Beatport’s reggae and dub chart, plus he’s already released a couple of albums – the superb 2010 collaboration with High Freequency, Soul Island Vol 1, and last year’s Babylon Annihilation. Pretty much all of it comes highly recommended.

Check it out:

 

Just Browsing: Free stuff on Soundcloud ... Part Four: Adventure Club

Christian Srigley and Leighton James are Adventure Club, a Montreal-based electronic/dubstep production duo clearly intent on making their music as accessible and as widely available as possible by using sites like Soundcloud.

Indeed, Adventure Club’s own Soundcloud page expresses the following philosophy … “sharing is caring. Feel free to download, and share our music if you like it. Pass it on, paying for music is the worst” …

Primarily dubstep in nature, but with a crispy euphoric dancefloor slant, Adventure Club is at its best when recasting the work of other artists, but from all accounts the duo are equally at home producing their own stuff, and several of the freely available files are issued purely under the Adventure Club moniker.

But it is the remix work that appeals most, and highlights of Adventure Club’s relatively prolific output to date include its reworking of fellow Canadian band Metric’s ‘Collect Call’, the slightly bent transformation given to the Yeah Yeah Yeah’s otherwise ordinary ‘Wait’ (clip below), and my own personal fave Adventure Club moment – the heavy stepper bottom end added to Irish folkie James Vincent McMorrow’s ‘We Don’t Eat’ (clip below).

Formed in early 2011, Adventure Club already has something fast approaching 200,000 Facebook followers, so they’re hardly an unknown quantity, or even particularly low profile, and they probably don’t really need the likes of me to help give them additional exposure but in years to come Srigley and James are going to be huge, I’m already quite sure of it … make sure you can say you were there right at the start.

Start here: Soundcloud

And find more free downloads on Facebook

Adventure Club - Wait:

James Vincent McMorrow - We Don't Eat (Adventure Club Dubstep Remix):

Just Browsing: Free stuff on Soundcloud ... Part Three: Dubmatix

It’s fair to say that with a handful of full-length album releases and a large number of other digital releases safely stashed away in his swag bag, Toronto-based producer Dubmatix (aka Jesse King) is no mere novice or low profile newcomer. But he’s worthy of mention here simply because in Soundcloud terms he remains my most reliable “go to” guy whenever I’m looking for a fix of conscious roots or steppa-style dub … which, it’s also fair to say, is quite often these days.

I first stumbled across his work in late 2010 via a remix of Bob Marley’s ‘Is This Love’ (Dubmatix Re-Visioned) and have subsequently over the past 18 months found myself repeatedly returning to his Soundcloud and/or Bandcamp pages to dig out new gems from the vast back catalogue of free downloads available. Seldom am I disappointed with what I find there.

It isn’t just the work of other artists that King explores; he is a brilliant musician in his own right, a multi-instrumentalist, and many of the releases are exclusively his own work. There are plenty of collaborations to sate the appetite too, with a veritable who’s who of more established artists right across the spectrum – from rocksteady (the late Alton Ellis) to roots (Mighty Diamonds, Michael Rose) to more current flavours (Brother Culture, Easy Stars) – having all benefitted from the gritty down to earth Dubmatix treatment.

On all of his releases, somehow this Canadian white guy manages to conjure up the spirit of a long repressed Jamaican exploring his deepest darkest Ethiopian roots, all albums (look for CD releases as well as digital files) are recommended listening, and I retain personal affection for his 2011 Clash Of The Titans – The System Shakedown Remixes set.

Spoil yourself here:

http://soundcloud.com/dubmatix

http://dubmatix.bandcamp.com/

And have a listen to one from the archives:

And a truly respectful tempo-bending variation on one of Bob Marley’s best loved treasures … great stuff:

Just Browsing: Free stuff on Soundcloud ... Part Two: Kill Paris

Another guy putting loads of free stuff out there on Soundcloud is popular Beatport artist Kill Paris (aka Corey Baker), an LA-based DJ and producer.

In the studio, his remixing and wider production work has helped transform Funk classics like Patrice Rushen’s ‘Forget Me Nots’ and Prince’s ‘I Wanna Be Your Lover’ (among many others of the same ilk) into works of modern musical art. He’s not been shy about applying his own slightly twisted take to more recent works either – his polishing up of Lana Del Rey’s ‘Without You’ being one recent case in point … even if I’m not quite so keen on that one personally.

Kill Paris has also nurtured a strong following as a live/touring DJ, having supported the high profile likes of Benny Benassi, while regularly touring across North America in his own right. It’s very difficult to pin a label on Kill Paris; some electro, techno, straight up disco, all with something of a dubstep bent.

Have a listen and decide for yourself  …

http://soundcloud.com/killparis

Just Browsing: Free stuff on Soundcloud … Part One: Willow Beats

I’ve been spending a fair bit of time on Soundcloud recently. Exploring different genres, listening to remixes, learning what’s apparently “hot” and what’s not. I love nothing better than scrolling through the tracks on offer, being selective, keeping a beady eye out for the free download option (most files at good quality 320kbps). Generally the site is a breeze to use and has terrific search functions. I tend to release the little speech bubble on most tracks to instantly rid myself of the comments (not unlike those pesky ads on Youtube); there’s only so many times you can read the words “sick track” and other similarly generic or inane comments before a small ball of vomit starts to form in the back of your throat (perhaps that’s just you? – Ed). But the download function is straightforward enough and the site’s vast range of active contributors means there’s always something fresh and interesting to catch the ear. Almost too much, in fact.

So concentrating on Soundcloud first and foremost, I thought it might be fun to document a few of these discoveries over a series of posts (as and when). Whether the artists/producers are signed, unsigned, or merely a gifted bedroom boffin, I’ll try to use this space to help put their work out there. I’ll stick to works that many of us would have been only too keen to fork out real cash money for not so very long ago … ah, the musical joys of the interweb.

Starting with … Willow Beats

One particularly observant Facebook friend turned me on to Willow Beats today, announcing them as “kids from Melbourne” …  before doing the linky love thing to hook me up with the Willow Beats Soundcloud and Bandcamp pages (see links below) – and a free download of the self-titled March 2012 five track “EP” release. 

Willow Beats is effectively Narayana Johnson, a 23-year-old Melbourne-schooled producer with a ton of compositional talent. Johnson’s default setting appears to be steppy electronica – almost glitchy in nature at times – and while the EP reveals a rather large size nine placed firmly in the dreamy ambient camp, there’s a genuinely rich dubstep feel to the whole thing.

Johnson’s collaborator on the EP is the honey voiced Kalyani Ellis, whose nonchalant other-worldly approach to the art of vocals blends perfectly with Johnson’s dark bass driven vibes. The result is something instantly delicious and accessible.

All five tracks on the Willow Beats EP are worth checking out ... and hey, it’s all free and accounted for!

Here’s Willow Beats claiming a lovely slice of Bowie’s eternal classic ‘Space Oddity’:

http://soundcloud.com/willowbeats

http://willowbeats.bandcamp.com/album/willow-beats