eops Albums of the year 2012

The end of the world show ... part two.

At the turn of the Millennium I mixed a tape for a friend called “The End of the World Show” – you know ... just in case. It wasn’t very good but it got me thinking; if you were going to select tracks for the final mix before the apocalypse what would you really want to hear? Do you really want to drift into the afterlife dooming over a Joy Division riff? It might be more fun to go out punching the air shouting “Lager, Lager, Lager”?

2012 was slated to bring the end of days but as any self respecting Mayan will tell you predicting an apocalypse is a tricky business. The fact is that doomsday will almost certainly arrive when you least expect it to. It’s frankly unlikely you will have had time to prepare your ideal soundtrack to oblivion. I clearly wasn’t ready for the world to end this year but if I had drifted into the afterlife last Friday then this is what I would have been listening to.

10 Brother Sun, Sister Moon: Brother Sun, Sister Moon (Denovali Records) 

Brother Sun, Sister Moon: All you need.

This beautifully packaged gem on Denovali Records is a daydreamers delight. Drenched in sunshine and recorded completely in soft focus by Roof Lights’ Gareth Munday, the album features the breathy vocal talents of Alicia Merz from Birds of Passage. I loved its quirky psychedelia, clever use of field recordings and Drake-like guitar pickings drowning in the reverb alongside some wonderfully subtle breaks. It’s post Trip-hop warmth mixes perfectly with a Slowdive like Indie sound that stares resolutely at its shoes despite the summery feel.

9 Toy – Toy (Heavenly Records) 

Toy: Motoring.

There's a lot of music industry chatter about Toy - so much so it got quite off putting long before I'd heard a note of actual music. Like their fellow haircuts 'The Horrors' they are often reviled for being ‘scenesters’ (whatever that actually means). It’s a shame because that sort of talk really distracts from a well thought out and perfectly executed exercise in Gothic tinged UK Psyche. It took me a while to lean in to their sound but after hunkering down into the glory hole that is ‘Kopter’ I found myself yearning to slip into a pair of drainpipe jeans and poorly buttoned paisley shirt. Luckily for you I resist this urge but I am happy to listen to it whatever anyone says.

8 Mala: Mala in Cuba (Brownswood Recordings) 

Mala: Changuito.

Mala is serious about his music that attracts a certain type of poe-faced critic, I read one review of this LP that bemoaned the fact 'Mala in Cuba' had failed to become ‘coffee table Dubstep’ album for the masses. It went on to complain that the music was sample driven and that Mala should have used longer passages from his Cuban recordings to show off the musicality of the people that played for him. If you will pardon my vernacular: WTF? This for me is exactly why the album is so successful, not a reason to look down on it. Mala remains true to the music he helped create; the samples are clipped and frame the basslines like all the best Dubstep tracks. This gives them a potent urgency that would surely be lost if the project were to become some sort of Buena Vista Social Club museum piece. As the saying goes – you can take the boy out of Croydon, but you cant take Croydon out of the boy, Mala in Cuba is all the better for it. 

7 Tame Impala: Lonerism (Modular Recordings) 

Tame Impala: Elephant.

Tame Impala peddle the sort of tripped out sonics that should be a perfect fit for me but despite enjoying their first effort ‘Innervisions’ I felt it was all a bit too derivative of the Beatles melody wise. Ask Liam and Noel – that shit doesn’t last. However ‘Lonerism’ fully rights that wrong. This is now a mature sound being made by a confident producer. Confident enough to glam it up a bit in places and still drop the tempo earnestly when required. In fact it makes me want to shake my big grey trunk all up in your face.

6 Ty Segall: Twins (Drag City) 

Ty Segall: Would you be my love?

Some of my favourite musicians are absolute perfectionists who painstakingly produce inch perfect pop records over months, years and sometimes decades of self imposed studio isolation. Unfortunately the best way to ruin the intended spirit of any song is to overproduce it and that leaves a thin line between perfecting the magnum opus and obsessively polishing a turd. Ty Segall knows that sometimes its better to thrash something out with feeling then release it warts and all than to deprive the world of a few rough edges for the sake of musical vanity. Twins is an audio bulldozer with a wrecking ball attached, it contains some genuinely melodic moments that can charm the pants off you but it delivers them with the sort of gusto you would expect of a rowdy garage blues man drinking JD straight from the bottle. Play it loud.

5 Death Grips: The Money Store (Epic Records) 

Death Grips: The fever (aye, aye).
Whilst in my everyday life I am a mild mannered company man politely ghosting my way through society I do, on occasion, get an overwhelming urge to set fire to famous buildings and run amok through the streets. This sort of teenage blood lust requires a soundtrack suitably enraged with contempt for the norm. Death Grips are the first band I’ve heard in a long time that genuinely sounded threatening on first listen. Sounding truly shocking is an extremely difficult thing to do in the modern world, but Death Grips storm out of the speakers to desecrate your ears with aplomb. Most importantly whilst some may argue this sound is closer connected to Punk, Juke and Ghetto-Tech than Hip-Hop, this is the first ‘rap’ album that has truly surprised me in years evoking memories of the first time I heard Public Enemy or N.W.A. It's also been a joy to watch 'Epic Records' take the massive risk of signing such a militant artist and then watch helplessly as Death Grips impatiently released their follow up album 'No Love Deep Web' against their wishes on the Internet for free. It's every bit as powerful as 'The Money Store' and features a cover that shows the title written large in marker pen across a band members, 'member' (yes, his penis.) Classy stuff there from MC Ride and company, you go tell the man! If you were a teenager today this shit would definitely annoy and alienate your parents – I can think of no higher praise. 

4 Actress: RIP (Honest Jon’s Records)

Actress: N.E.W.

Detroit, Chicago, Sheffield, London, Berlin … techno reviews often sound like a travelogue of post industrial cities to which the roots of electronica are retraced for reference points but the real truth behind great electronic music is that if done correctly the best techno sounds like it wasn’t even made on this planet. Actress (British producer Darren J. Cunningham) is prime example of some fresh thinking livening up a genre prone to repetition (literally). It’s hard to put your finger on exactly how Actress perform this trick but its clearly more than smoke and mirrors. R.I.P. is a deep, thoughtful album reminiscent of Boards of Canada or Speedy J in their pomp. The lines are clean and controlled; in its quieter moments songs like ‘N.E.W’ draw the listener in like a sonic tractor beam. So let’s not dwell on Earthly locations like London and Detroit – lets just sit back and enjoy the ride.

3 Grizzly Bear: Shields (4AD) 

Grizzly Bear: Gun shy.

Grizzly Bear recently claimed that their audience in Europe was ‘too old and too male’. It’s a fair cop I suppose but think on young cubs, as Tony Soprano would say, “You don’t shit where you eat”.  I can see why HMV's £50 man appreciates this sophisticated music. Its cool but you could slip it on at a dinner party and no one would complain, you could then look pretty hip waxing lyrical about them from the confines of the kitchen. It encourages the old school indie boys to do a bit more paunch gazing but we shouldn't hold that against it. The music on Shields is simply wonderful in places and I love the way it melts through your thoughts at the end of the evening. It's like the last sip of red wine dissolving on the back of your tongue, you want to savour it and hold it in your mouth because you know when it’s gone so is the moment. 

2 Liars: WIXIW (Mute) 

Liars: Brats.

When an indie band announces that their next LP will see them ‘go electronic’ it can be easy to accidentally blind yourself by rolling your eyes too hard. It’s a very difficult transition to make and one that is often severely underestimated by already successful musicians. However when it works it can free a band from the shackles of expectation and see them transcend their genre. Liars, like Radiohead before them have got the transition spot on. Just like ‘Kid A’ this was a squid like attempt at deliberate obfuscation and 'WIXIW' is an inky pool of an album. There is more than a touch of desafinado in this selection. The whole experience is claustrophobic, keyboards detune and the lyrics paint a bleak scene over sparse deliberate rhythms. This isn’t the record your life coach will want to add to the motivational playlist. What life coaches don’t get is that sometimes you want to wallow in the darkness; sometimes you need to make space for yourself to be depressed and deal with stuff before you hop along the yellow brick road. Music can be the best companion in the darkest days. As black as the cover it comes in 'WIXIW' is an ebony gem and even though the melancholy is Dickensian, Liars are not a one note band and they even manage to make time for a bit of 'Bleak House' on the sublime 'Brats'. Play it on your own.

1 Shackleton: Music for the Quiet Hour/The Drawbar Organ EP's (Woe to the septic heart!) 

Shackleton: Music for the quiet hour (Part three).

When you are forever snuffling for truffles in the musical orchard sometimes you need to remind your inner truffle pig exactly what you are looking for. The ideal outcome for me is to find something unexpected and yet familiar, after all, great music is an evolution, with artists standing on the shoulders of giants. That said it has to move things on. It doesn’t have to be fashionable or even successful – it just has to amaze the listener in some way and perhaps capture something of the time. Music is a time based medium and yet its often not judged in the same way a film is. Too often music is seen as something can just be ‘on’ … ‘in the background’ … ‘Heart FM’. In a cinema everyone would sit through something light and easy, lot of people will chance a horror film, some will invest time in a moving documentary and a few will take in an art house movie. What everyone does is sit in the dark with their phones off for two hours essentially concentrating on the film. I always feel its so sad that so few people attempt to do this with music, Gil Scott-Heron agrees. 

Music for the Quiet Hour is not an easy listen. Producer Sam Shackleton deliberately agitates the listener with an armoury of studio tricks. Endlessly rising Shepard Tones ratchet up the tension, the use of stereo is dizzying and the oft' forgotten art of dynamic production provides peaks to every trough. There are points when you feel truly unsettled by the music, but its worth remembering that to really feel the release of music you need to endure the build up – as I said it’s a 'time based medium'. This is a unique piece of work and should be endured and ultimately enjoyed as if it was a dark science fiction screening that demands your attention. You only need do it once – go on, I promise it will be much more rewarding than Avatar. You might love it, you might hate it … but either way you really can’t deny its power and craft.

Compilation of the year:

Jeff Mills – Sequence: A Retrospective of Axis records (Axis)

Techno, techno, techno … but not as you know it, eminently listenable and perfectly judged tunes created by the 'Wizard' – Jeff Mills: Godfather of techno.

Reissue of the year:

My Bloody valentine: Isn’t anything/Loveless/EP’s 1988-1991 (Sony)

Seminal noise pop barely covers it, these are stone cold classics and in many ways the EP’s combine to create a long lost MBV LP for those that missed the vinyl first time round.

Nearly ran’s …

They were lots of great albums this year but I don’t have time to review them all so to save space I shall précis the 'best of the rest' in Haiku form.

Sharon Van Etten: Tramp (Jagjaguar)

Singer Songwriters

Normally Irritating

This one is quite good 

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti: Mature themes (4AD)

Mercurial guy

Incoherent bontempi

To be expected 

Carter Tutti Void: Tranverse (Mute)

Factory/Gristle

An ’art’ collaboration

Synthesiser porn 

Godspeed you! Black Emperor: 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend! (Constellation)

Canadian band

Better than Nickleback eh?

SONIC CATHEDRAL! 

Dexys: One day I’m going to soar (BMG)

Twenty-seven years

Rowland talks all over it

It’s rather a shame 

Any other business?

Well ... I like to think I did pretty well with my 3 to watch in 2012 blog.

While Addison Groove’s debut LP didn’t quite hit the spot, labels like Swamp 81, Hemlock and Hessle Audio have hit a rich vein of form producing some of the most interesting dance music around.

Roof Light had a hand in the excellent Brother Sun, Sister Moon LP as I mentioned above but there were also a couple of skittish house tracks and simply beautiful 12" on Styrax under the moniker GhostLight.

But I take all the credit for giving early props to … 

Throwing Snow

Throwing Snow: Perca (Taken from the Clamor EP).

Throwing Snow really began to make a mark this year with a session for Radio1Xtra, remixes galore, critical acclaim and a new label at his disposal. The Clamor and Aspera EP’s were rich and varied 4 trackers that had real finesse to them. Snow Ghosts the much-anticipated collaboration with Augustus Ghost should appear soon and I have feeling 2013 will see Ross Tones and company go from strength to strength.

Thanks for reading – please buy your music if you really like it. I don't want to encourage the use of Spotify but I'm sure you will find most of the artists featured on there if you search.

Also …

I seem to manage about three posts a year on here so I’ll try and up the work-rate somewhat with smaller posts that require little or no forethought.

Meanwhile I’d welcome your recommendations for the doomsday mix-tape, 'Haiku Reviews', comments, shares and RTs.

Here’s to the next thing that makes us go: O_O

@eops

eops 'The Goth Years'

So I wrote a blog for My Band T-Shirt all about my beloved Bauhaus T and the sad demise of my T-shirt collection not long ago. I got a lot of great feedback about whats essentially quite a personal story so I thought I'd re-post it here for posterity. 

Strange as it seems before the Raving I was a black-dyed-in-the-wool Goth. Winkle-picker boots, leather jacket, flowery shirt and jet black eye liner. It was great. The greatness was not necessarily in being a Goth but rather in being able to look in the mirror and know that whatever I was, I wasn't one of 'them' ... 'normal people'. 

It wasn't easy either... I had curly ginger hair that didn't respond well to hair gel. I had to slick it all back with soap, blow-dry it, then furiously back comb and crimp it to get the right effect (Mac from Echo & The Bunnymen was my 'dream look'). This system worked well until it rained, then I would begin to froth at the scalp and expunge a strange smell of soapy apples, oh yes, I was a keeper. It kept me fit too, mostly because of all the running I did. I pretty much ran everywhere to avoid being beaten to death by a small town Gorilla in loafers and a 'casual' shirt.  

But you know what? Despite the constant threat of being found in a frothy pool of blood and apple scented soap I loved being a Goth, I met some great people and went to some amazing gigs, I also got to wear make up, get off with girls in suspenders and look miserable without reproach. Anyway this is how is all started...

My Band T-Shirt: Bauhaus, "eyes"

When I was a kid I felt surrounded by uniforms.

They were everywhere it seemed, my Father was in the American Air Force and we lived on a Military Base where literally everyone had a uniform of some description.

We were a staunch Roman Catholic family so there was no escape even at the weekend. We would dutifully go to Church and Sunday School where flamboyant priests wore their vestments as a badge of holy authority, Nuns would herd us around like spiritual penguins and if you were good you might get selected as an altar boy and get to put on a frock yourself. 

As a very young kid it never bothered me, I could see they were a different breed to me. Even when I dressed up in my Sunday best there was a certain flamboyant 70’s style that made my get up individual, if garish.

Like any parent my Mom had phases of dressing us up in matching clothes. We did everything; matching silk Bomber Jackets (that made us look like refugees from a bowling team), identical Sky-Lab themed cardigans (that any Shoreditch Hipster would give their right arm for now), and the high water mark of 70’s kids wear, a vomitus rainbow patterned Nylon jump suit thing that both me and my brother were ‘actually photographed in’ one Easter.

It was exciting at first but eventually the sheer amount of well meaning comments we got began to make us kids suspicious. There was just an inkling brewing that we may have looked like idiots.

Oh the 70s.

As we neared the end of the 70’s we moved to England and after a further year of American education I was shipped wholesale into an English Catholic School (run by Irish Nuns naturally). It was never going to be easy, I was a snotty kid, I had an American accent and … I was ginger.

You might think a school uniform would act as a leveler to these outsider feelings but kids are way to sharp for that. Kids know when you don’t belong. Even my uniform was odd; my buttons were bigger than the English kids’ buttons. My shirts were short sleeved, my tie latched around my neck like an angry blue & white python and my feet were shod in the most ridiculous cowboy boots that added an audio clumsiness to my already wonky demeanor.

I was not happy about the switch to England. I was a Giraffe at a Zebra party. My Mother thought the best policy was to encourage me to join in with various after school activities. I’d seen my brother in the American boy scouts so it seemed sensible to join the Cubs. However my uniform was again cobbled together, imagine my shame when I was the only boy without a regulation woggle. Having 30 English kids taking the piss out of your woggle was beyond the pale.

So there I was, … still surrounded by uniforms. Priests would visit the house and act like I should know them but then the Nuns would then destroy my self-confidence daily at school. At the weekends, I would sit outside the officers club on the Air Base with a warm bottle of coke listening to my Dads Air Force buddies get the best of the attention I craved from my Master Sergeant Father.

The only thing ‘uniform’ about my relationship with uniforms was alienation.

The only places far enough removed from my reality to allow me to relax in were in ‘my prayers’ and in ‘my music’. After all David Bowie was even more alien than Jesus and he had a much better back catalogue to explore.

There it was the road to salvation, no, not the religion, the music.

My interest in religion peaked around 16 or 17. Every time I could feel the church soothing my soul I seemed to find another uniformed hypocrite discrediting all I had learned. Passive aggression, twisting guilt and blatant sinning was the order of the day. Finally a hushed up sex scandal involving the local priest (but not me thank goodness) made me decide the uniforms had to go.

So what does a young boy do? I still didn’t want to be alone; I just wanted to fit in.

The logic ran thus: If I don’t fit in there MUST be others who don’t fit in…

WHERE DO THEY FIT IN? … Or not, if you follow me.

David Bowie did eventually bring the answer, but only indirectly. It was the Bauhaus cover version of Ziggy Stardust that really made the change, it was an unlikely Top40 hit and they looked MENTAL on Top of the Pops. 

I began to spot a trend amongst my older sisters’ friends, there was a look developing, it was black, it was scruffy and it featured Peter Murphy’s eyes.

Long before I could bump into a gig or indeed clothes shop for myself I began to lust after that Bauhaus shirt with the eyes. The only people who wore that shirt were misfits, dropouts, and freaks!

I began to cut away from the pop music of my peers. I remember playing ‘The Psychedelic Furs’ to a bemused mate on the day he bought ‘Uptown Girl’ by Billy Joel – I don’t think he never came round again. While my brothers went on to join the US Navy my sister and I joined CND. I crimped my curly ginger hair straight (which looked as ridiculous as it sounds), then, after a lifetime of waiting, at last, the ‘sixth form’ came along and with it my release from compulsory uniform.

A compulsory uniform that I duly swapped wholesale for another, but this time a dark gothic one that offended my teachers’ eyes. I found a mail order catalogue that sold me winkle-picker boots, a leather jacket, drainpipe jeans, a studded belt and of course … Peter Murphy’s eyes!

My life became a stream of gigs and T-shirts, each time I returned late to school I felt even more of a freak … but now I began to relish it! I remember being told I couldn’t take Holy Communion in a Jesus and Mary Chain T-shirt despite being the only kid in my class who still went to mass on a Sunday. I was pushed further and further away from dogma and compliance and it felt good!

Then there was a moment of clarity at Reading Festival when I looked around and thought:

“I have never seen so many GINGERS in one place! My people …I HAVE FOUND YOU!”

So anyway, coming back to the point - when I found out about the blog My Band T-Shirt I felt compelled to write something. Alas it took longer than anticipated because at one point in my mid 20’s I had stumbled into a very sensible relationship and something terrible happened.

My then partner was not a freak. She was a nice girl. She was doing her ‘wild rebellion’ like a poorly paid gap year when she met me and it soon became apparent that she expected me to grow up with her when it was over.

Things had already changed; Rave had broken the monotonous uniform of black clothing and drainpipe jeans that carried me into the 90s. Instead we began to sweat our individuality into our Global Hyper-Colour tops. That was a sea change for me but for her it was just the start of a new direction.

She bought me a suede blazer jacket to replace my painted leather jacket. She began to ask questions about what ‘we’ were going to do about all my old T-Shirts. The alarm bells were ringing but she (being handy with a needle) offered to ‘make them into something’, she would sew them into a patchwork blanket thing so I didn’t have to throw them out (an offer forced into existence by my refusal to do the latter). So I ruefully gave her all my shirts.

Soon our life together began to drag, plans were being made, events were being dutifully attended and even her Airline Pilot Father complimented me on a pair of sensible shoes I was asked to wear.

I could see the uniforms coming to get me and I wasn’t going to go out like that. I panicked and split with the girl – she, to the best of my knowledge, burned my rebellious shirts. At the time it didn’t really matter, I knew I could never go back to those days anyway, life had moved on. Please don’t get me wrong, she was a lovely girl, but she had a very different outlook from me, it was always doomed.

So anyway, when I decided to write something for the blog I journeyed deep into the heart of my wardrobe but the pickings were awfully slim.

There was no Wedding Present ‘Russian Tour’, no My Bloody Valentine ‘Kiss’, no embarrassing Gene Loves Jezebel, Mission or Balaam & the Angel T’s. In fact apart from solitary Loop shirt (Id been wearing that fateful day), there was almost nothing to tell My Band T-Shirt about.

Then like a time team special – just when I thought I had nothing to show and tell, I found a relic of the past. Hidden in a bag that vaguely whiffed of Petula oil was my very own ‘Shroud of Turin’. A faded face looking out at me 30 years on, a testament to my faith in the freaks … my band T-shirt has Peter Murphy’s eyes.

And finally a fistful of Gothic... 

5 Tunes from the dark days: 

Sisters Of Mercy - Temple of Love

Bauhaus - Spirit

Siouxsie & the Banshees - Staircase Mystery

The Cramps - You got good taste (Live)

The Cure - All cats are grey

eops Pick 'n' Mix for 2012

Having spent the last post reviewing the best of the year in 20/20 hindsight I thought I had better put my money where my mouth is and ‘pick & mix’ 3 acts I reckon will make big waves in the coming year. This cannot end well.

TIP 1. ROOF LIGHT

Roof Light - Palm

I have never been short of ideas musically, just low on actual skill. I used to stand behind my ‘studio bitch’ and ride their knowledge like a pony. Life seemed pretty easy in those days but that all changed when I moved to London and I found myself flying solo. 

I set about earning my production stripes by trawling the sarcastic but invaluable vault of production treasure that is 'Dubstep Forum'. Quite early on I had a demo which (unsurprisingly) absolutely no-one was interested in listening to. I was poised to give up when a curiously named producer took the time to give me a few pointers, his name? Roof Light.

In return I followed the 'Roof Light Soundcloud' page. Immediately it was obvious that I had flukily stumbled on to a mercurial talent. The music on this page came in flurries, sometimes dozens of tracks would disappear overnight only to be replaced with an entirely new selection the following day. 

It was hard to put my finger on what exactly made Roof Light stand out but there seemed to be an unconscious musical thread stringing everything together from the most skittish Garage cuts to the deepest, gloomiest ambient soundscapes (such as the glorious but short-lived posting seemingly created as a requiem for Amy Winehouse). I felt this was an artist steeped in musical history - a feeling validated later by his DJ mixes such as this glorious double helping of sunny Psychedelia posted recently.

I became a bit of a fanboy if Im honest, I felt like I’d found gold in the Soundcloud hills. 

Thankfully Roof Light’s profile began to snowball, releases on ‘Styrax’, support from the likes of Laurent Garnier and eventually a management deal with ‘Westbury Music’ has made him stable mates with the likes of Four Hero, Goldie and Actress his star is definitely on the rise. 

Roof Light make such a wide range of music its hard to know what to expect next but I know I’ll be listening. Mark my words one day there will be an album and it will be impossible to ignore.

TIP 2. SNOW GHOSTS/THROWING SNOW

My second tip for 2012 is Ross Tones an artist who has already started ripping up trees under the name Throwing Snow. I had tipped Throwing Snow as my wildcard for 2011 in my end of year blog in 2010 and he has steadily delivered the goods with a series of impressive 12” releases. 

I cant claim any sort of finders fee however, I stumbled across Mr. Tones via a chance follow on Twitter. He posted a Tweet saying something about ‘fulfilling a childhood dream’ and I couldn’t help but ask what that dream was. As it happened his dream had been to release a 12” vinyl record and I could definitely identify with that. I popped into 'Phonica' one lunchtime and was utterly blown away by the tune. 

Throwing Snow - Un vingt

‘Un Vingt’ was lumped into the Dubstep rack but this was no honking Bro-Step by numbers. Instead it offered a clean musical palette that sparkled with a feeling of improvisation so often missing from electronic music. Over the coming year a string of unique releases built up and when he wasn’t at the controls himself he was running the remarkable ‘left_blank’ imprint which took Dubstep into the uncharted waters of sparse, minimal percussion.

Warm up slots at the Phonica parties gave way to festival appearances in Ireland and finally a slot at the influential ‘The Boiler Room’ web site. Throwing Snow had arrived like a well placed snowball on the face of 2011 and it seemed perfectly possible that Mr.Tones could just keep churning out the 12”s but that would be to underestimate the musician.

It seemed that there was another string to the Throwing Snow bow and that turned out to be the side project ‘Snow Ghosts’ on the Black Acre label. The project included a smokey voiced female singer and the sort of musical ambition that can produce ‘real songs’ the holy grail of the dance scene. 

Snow Ghosts - Lost at sea

The icy, gothic cool engendered by the first Snow Ghosts release ‘Lost at sea’ is the main reason why Ross Tones gets the nod again this year. Whilst I am still gagging for a full Throwing Snow album it seems this year is earmarked for the Snow Ghosts project and a debut LP is imminent. In a landscape blessed with the likes of Salem and SBTRKT I have a feeling Snow Ghosts will make a big noise in 2012.

TIP 3. ADDISON GROOVE (Juke & UK Bass)

Whilst both Roof Light and Snow Ghosts often revel in austere emotional journeys my final choice does exactly the opposite. Addison Groove is all about the dancing, its brash, bassy and built to rock a sound system. 

Addison Groove - Footcrab

In the 90’s I was resident at the Source in Oxford where I enjoyed a period of musical freedom that is hard to find in modern clubland. Whilst the drum and bass heavyweights threatened the buildings structural integrity upstairs I got a chance to play ‘freestyle’ in the cellar. I was always looking for an upbeat feeling and a friend turned me on to Dance Mania and DJ Funk in particular. It was block rocking party music steeped in lyrical idiocy and trouser flapping bass that seemed to mix right in. 

Its a fine line to walk when you start playing booty tracks, these are objectionable records whose casual misogyny is difficult to defend but the music is often so hype that it charms the listener like a hyperactive child swearing for a laugh. Sometimes it would be the high point of the night and sometimes people would quite justifiably take offense. 

DJ Funk - Pussyride (Parental discretion iz advised)

In many ways Juke is the natural successor to the X-rated house of Dance Mania et al. If you are going to get your head around the music then its important to see the lineage from traditional Chicago House through Booty Bass and Ghetto House. In the end these siblings share a musical heritage rooted in the grim reality of urban America, there is a deep seated truth to these uncompromising styles and *that* is what makes them so influential.

Juke & Footwork - Like 'The Black' Riverdance ... or something.

“Bangs n Works” on Planet Mu Records is a crash course in unrefined Juke. Incessant barking samples, ludicrous speed and brutal drum machines that ‘go in dry’ all combine to give a unique but slightly unpleasant sensation. Dubstep (in its fashion), started out with equally uncompromising militancy. By the time labels like ‘Planet Mu’ got the chance to go out to the states and see the Juke scene first hand the internet had already started to cross pollinate the two bass heavy styles. The UK needed its own treatment of the sound and a number of labels such as ‘Planet Mu’, ‘Swamp 81’ and ‘3024’ began to warp Juke to fit the UK palette, slowing it down and reducing the Tourette’s style sample abuse. 

Over the last year or two there has been a slow but steady groundswell of appreciation for this sound. 2012 will see this ungainly bird spread its wings and fly I reckon. Don’t get me wrong, I cant see anything in the way of a crossover hit coming soon, thats really not how it (bangs &) works. This UK-centric take on Juke will prove its success in a subtler fashion by changing the way house, electro and bass are used in a modern production. Already we see the likes of Pearson Sound (nee Ramadan Man) genetically modifying house in the UK with triplet swing and booming backbeats.

Pearson Sound Vs Hardrive - Deep Inside (UK Bass)

The new Addison Groove LP is imminent and I expect it to have a huge influence on the music makers in 2012, and by proxy the clubbers in 2013 ... some time in 2014 you might start to hear the reverberations in less niche music too. After all we have seen Dubstep wobble the likes of Britainy Spears, Cher Lloyd and even the humble 'Weet-A-Bix' advert. 

So do yourself a favour and get ahead of the curve ... its really only house music.

FOOTCRAB! FOOTCRAB! FOOTCRAB! FOOTCRAB! FOOTCRAB! FOOTCRAB! etc ...

CURIOUS? 

Try my latest mix featuring Addison Groove & Throwing Snow:

Enjoy,

eops