house music
theartsdesk Q&A: Musician/DJ Mark Hawkins aka Marquis HawkesMonday, 29 August 2016This is not a standard dance music story. Marquis Hawkes is one of the club music success stories of the past couple of years – since the first release in 2012 on Glasgow's revered Dixon Avenue Basement Jams, there've been many 12" club hits on... Read more... |
Campo Sancho 2016Sunday, 07 August 2016“Ooooh, it’s gorgeous!” exclaimed my wife-to-be as we arrived at what had been described as “an oasis in Hertfordshire.” They weren’t kidding, either. The site for the inaugural festival organised by Notting Hill Carnival stalwarts Sancho Panza... Read more... |
CD: Mark Barrott - Sketches from an Island 2Wednesday, 22 June 2016The EU referendum isn’t the only thing causing polarised opinion over European issues. The question of what constitutes Balearic Beat looms large over the music community. For some, it’s a fixed point, namely celebrated DJ Alfredo’s record box in... Read more... |
CD: Rodion – GeneratorThursday, 07 April 2016Before the resurgence in vinyl, and the resultant pursuit of audiophile perfection on pointlessly expensive sound systems, was the musician’s fetish for vintage equipment and analogue synths. Live, this makes sense: sounds go direct into the... Read more... |
CD: Underworld – Barbara Barbara, We Face a Shining FutureWednesday, 16 March 2016After the release of 2006’s Barking, it was difficult to know what to make of Underworld. A couple of decent songs aside, collaboration seemed to have stripped away identity, leaving us with sketches on which a host of different producers had... Read more... |
Tony Allen and Jimi Tenor, Café OTOSaturday, 23 January 2016Questions of what is authentic and what is retro get more complicated the more the information economy matures. Music from decades past that only tens or hundreds of people heard at the time it was made becomes readily available, gets sampled by new... Read more... |
Albums of 2015: Ruf Dug – IslandThursday, 24 December 20152015 was a phenomenal year for new music. As such, choosing just one album seems an arduous if not impossible task. But Christmas is, as we know, a time where arduous tasks are very much the order of the day, as we inconvenience ourselves routinely... Read more... |
CD: Syracuse - Liquid Silver DreamMonday, 02 November 2015There's a current running through the underground club / electronic music of the 2010s that cares not a jot for progress – but neither is it retro as such. It's been called “outsider house”, which is a pretty lame name for stuff that is often... Read more... |
CD: Ruf Dug – IslandThursday, 06 August 2015Producer Ruf Dug has released a slew of singles and remixes, both on his own label, Ruf Kutz, and other independent imprints, including Porn Wax and Banoffee Pies, that have made the UK such an exciting prospect for new music for the past few years... Read more... |
CD: Four Tet - Morning/EveningWednesday, 05 August 2015There used to be a time when albums would regularly come in at around the 45-minute mark. It was pretty much the perfect length for fitting on to one side of a C90 (disclaimer: Home Taping Is Killing Music) and made the most of the vinyl format’s... Read more... |
CD: Julio Bashmore - Knockin' BootsSaturday, 01 August 2015“Julio Bashmore” is actually the nom-de-dancefloor of Bristolian DJ-producer Matt Walker who’s been slowly building a rep over the last five years. Outside clubland, music-lovers may have heard of him via his production on Jessie Ware’s early... Read more... |
CD: Satoshi Tomiie - New DaySunday, 28 June 2015Here's a funny one: used as an adjective, “lifestyle” has lately become a popular pejorative term for music (see, most recently, the kerfuffle over Jamie xx's debut solo album). It's taken the place of “coffee table”, which was the Nineties phrase... Read more... |