Beats In Mind land in our premiere spotlight today with a track taken from their Headsbass Volume 1 LP. Chris.SU comes correct with a massive dancefloor roller that brings to mind vintage Black Sun Empire Recordings releases from the early 2000s. All proceeds from the LP will go towards mental health charities…great beats for a great cause. Watch out for this one coming April 24th at digital stores!
Featuring some seriously heavyweight new beats from leading players and rising stars in the neurofunk scene alike, Mindtech’s Peace of Mind LP is a force to be reckoned with and then some; essential listening for fans of hard impact, forward thinking D&B sounds.
The nice folk at Mindtech have given us a CD of the album and some stickers to give away to one lucky winner! To be in with a chance of winning, all you have to do is like the DNB Dojo Facebook page, like the Mindtech Recordings Facebook page, and send an email to competitions@dnbdojo.co.uk with your name & address and the subject line “Mindtech Competition”. The winner will be drawn on May 21st.
Meanwhile you can check out clips of the album below – hit up Beatport or the Mindtech store to grab a copy right now.
Commercial Suicide have brought together the great and the good of the neurofunk scene to remix tracks from Mindscape’s Martin Chronicles LP. To celebrate the release of part 1 (and the impending release of part 2), we asked Mindscape to pick out his 5 favourite D&B remixes. Read on for his choices!
Mav drops his debut album for Scientific Records, featuring a selection of melody driven D&B tunes and some big remixes to boot. Asides from terrific compositions with tons of character, the album also features a couple of DJ friendly genre-hopping tracks, with Makati Oasis dropping down to a cheeky house-tempo bridge and Trigger the Rabbit flirting with bouncy breaks for an interlude from it’s D&B verses.
Elsewhere there’s a fantastic future-funk amen workout on Break Is The Legend and soaring arpeggios aplenty on The Dolphin and the Bassline. Remix-wise, highlights include Chris.SU’s rolling dancefloor remix of Me Against The Machine, Seba’s deep atmospheric relick of Between Heaven and the Deep Blue Sea and Bungle’s super chilled remix of Skylines. Check out the tracks below and grab this one on vinyl or digital now!
Sun & Bass continue their tradition from last year and release another stellar compilation featuring cuts from the festival’s regular DJs, with a host of big names on board. The first half of the compilation leans heavily in the deep liquid direction, with a collection of rollers and steppers from Triad, Fracture & Mark System, Seba, Alite & Arp XP and more. Tokyo Prose steal the show for me with the sublime, twinkling piano and crisp breaks of Goodbye Hands…truly a tune you could lose yourself in.
The second half of the selection sees the heat turned up with harder beats from Klute, Chris SU and Nymfo, Dom & Roland and more. Ulterior Motive turn in a strong, squelchy stepper with Fragola Invisible and Audio Habitat collaborates with Mad Vibes for a good old fashioned dirty roller. The LP closes up with a few more soulful numbers from dBridge, Code 3 and Zero T for good measure.
Check out all the beats below and watch out for the release dropping on digital from December 16th. Don’t forget you can also pick up the sublime Calibre/Paradox remix 12″ from Surus now!
Black Sun Empire return with yet another essential release for neurofunk fans everywhere as they open up their back catalogue for remixes from a selection of the biggest names in the scene. Among the best released so far are Noisia’s epic rework of Arrakis, State of Mind’s rolling rework of Don’t You and Chris.SU’s typically heavy hitting yet melodic rework of Fever. There are many more yet unheard tracks so keep an eye on soundcloud and youtube over the coming weeks rolling up to the release on November 18th.
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In addition BSE have teamed up with Beatport to allow folks the chance to win a bunch of Novation gear and a spot on the album by remixing their classic Noisia collaboration Hideous. Head on over to Beatport for the details and get to work!
Automate head honcho Esion gets on the 1s and 2s to deliver a stomping 75 minute mix of wall to wall neurofunk bangers. The tracklist speaks for itself really with beasting tracks from the likes of Prolix, Black Sun Empire, Break, The Upbeats, Noisia, Spor and Ed Rush to name just a few. Check it out below and grab yourself a free download in 320!
Hungarian D&B legend Chris.SU gears up to launch his own Fate imprint with a double A side featuring the vocal talents of Mira on a main-room roller and a stomping collaboration with Kiwi duo State of Mind. We caught up with the man to quiz him about his plans for the label and his favourite releases from the past decade.
DNB Dojo: You’ve got quite the discography going back over 10 years with releases on pretty much all the best labels in the tech/neuro scene. Why did you choose to start your own imprint now?
Chris.SU: I wanted to have an extra platform for my own releases so I could decide what track comes out and when. It also gives me extra inspiration that I’m fully responsible for the output to be released on FATE Recordings. I think in every aspect of life the key is trying to take small steps forward, so for me this was a natural next step in my music career. I’ve seen the good and the bad side of the D&B scene over the 13 years I have been active, so I thought: why not try doing it ‘my way’?
DD: Hungary’s D&B output seems stronger than ever with yourself, Mindscape and Jade at the top of your game. How has the scene changed over the years? Any new producers on the rise we should know about?
CS: We’ve got a quite old D&B scene in Hungary, with parties being organised since 1996. Production-wise around 2003-2005 the Hungarian scene became quite exciting I think. Some people say it was a specific ‘Hungarian Sound’ back in those days. Since then some of the producers like DJ Madd or Matt-U have switched to Dubstep and some of them, like SKC, stopped making tracks. But there are always new talents trying to break through. Magical Gravity and Incident have great potential and Klay is making some tracks supported by DJ Hype on Kiss FM for example. I always say to the new producers that the key is to work hard and not to make music for the fame, girls, or whatever reasons, but only for the love and passion for the music, and if you’re patient enough, you’ll get there where you deserve to be.
DD: The first release lined up for FATE sees you teaming up with State of Mind. Given their base in New Zealand, how did that come about? Were you guys physically together in the studio?
CS: I first met the State of Mind guys back in 2006 when I was on tour in NZ with Concord Dawn and Matty C introduced them to me. Our friendship has lasted since then and we did The Burning in my studio with Stu when he was on his European Tour. I always prefer being physically together in the studio but I did my collaborations with Nymfo over the internet.
DD: Many of your tunes (including Together In The Night) bridge the gap between the heavier beats and bass of neurofunk D&B and the more melodic elements of the liquid scene. Was it a conscious choice to evolve a style that blended the two styles, or just the way you found your sound evolving?
CS: The philosophy of FATE Recordings is “fat beats with emotions” so it was a conscious choice to take that path with the sound. Friction said in his radio show on BBC Radio 1 that Together in the Night is a tune you can play on the radio or at a rave and it’ll work in both environments and this is something I wanted to achieve. You can make bangers but some of them won’t make any sense if you listen to it at home. I guess you can call it a new sub-genre…”Heavy Liquid”? 🙂
DD: Beyond the release of the first single, what can we expect from FATE in 2013 and beyond?
CS: I haven’t planned anything else for 2013 but in 2014 you can expect an EP with probably a few more vocal tunes on it. I have just released Guardian Angel with MC Fedora on Subtitles UK and I’m planning to make more tunes with her, and also with Mira, and I’m planning to make more collaborations with my friends around the globe like Nymfo, State of Mind and, of course, fellow Hungarians Mindscape and Jade.
DD: The past few years have seen an increase in the number of D&B producers releasing solo albums. Is this something you’re interested in, or do you prefer the single/EP format?
CS: A solo album is definitely on the cards but first I wanted to have a few singles and EPs out to familiarize people with FATE Recordings and what sort of sound they can expect in the future. Every beginning is difficult and I don’t want to rush out anything. For an album a lot of planning is required as the timing needs to be perfect.
DD: Of all your past releases, what’s your favourite and why? I think for me it would be between Solaris Theme VIP and First Snow, though it’s a tough choice!
CS: It’s tough to pick one from your own tracks having listened to them a million times but Solaris Theme VIP and First Snow have to be two of my most complete tracks to date. I also still like Deeper with State of Mind, Changing Slowly from my times with Tactile, and my remix of Bjork’s All is Full of Love 🙂
Check out the single below and watch out for the release from October 21st.
After too many years of staring at the lineups and wishing I was there, 2013 was finally the year for a pilgrimage to Sun & Bass. Held in San Teodoro on the beautiful island of Sardinia, the festival offers eight nights of the best D&B DJs in the world. If you don’t believe it, have a gander at the lineup. Given the length of the event, this review will be split up into separate posts. Read on for part one…
Chris.Su’s Solaris Theme still holds its own as one of the most memorable tracks from the Subtitles back catalogue. Fusing liquid sensibilities with slightly darker neurofunk elements and making excellent use of samples from Soderbergh’s film, the track is as infectious as it is understated. The build up is hauntingly beautiful, Natasha McElhone’s voice echoing through the mix – “Don’t you love me anymore?” – and when the drop hits, soaring synths combine with a bassline with just enough teeth to produce a weighty roller imbued with a kind of muted, melancholic euphoria. Classic!
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jm8DrVjhRdY]