Picks Of The Week (24.04.21

1. AL/SO, Sovryn - Insanity EP [Korsakov Music]

Recommended if you like: Toronto Is Broken, Smooth, DC Breaks

Oh would you look at that, a review about a dancefloor release! Yes, go away /u/TELMxWILSON, I like this stuff too much to not write about it.

This week's first pick is a 3-track collaboration EP by two names you might not know too much about yet: AL/SO and Sovryn. Let's start with AL/SO and see where the story takes us, shall we?

AL/SO, also known as ALSO, also known as Baromar, also known as that Elmar guy, is a dutch producer with a not quite typical backstory. Back when he was still just Elmar van Eijk, he used to do field reports about the latest events he went to. He wrote for Clownsville, which lead him to writing for All Electronic Music, which progressed to him writing for Drumandbass.nl. Around 2014 he expanded his skill repertoire to also (I am so damn hyper aware of every single "also" in this paragraph) include DJing, as he started tearing up dancefloors around the world as Baromar. One fateful day around 2015, he went out to make a report about a new Rotterdam-based event called Korsakov. At that point Korsakov was still very much in its infancy, but still generating quite a lot of buzz by managing to book huge artists like The Prototypes, DC Breaks and Black Sun Empire. At that particular event, Elmar met and befriended the minds behind the already hugely successful event series, Sami Dmitrovic and Sacha van der Hoeff, which lead to him becoming involved as an artist handler for them.

Little fun fact about Korsakov: They are named after a type of chronic memory disorder you can get from drinking too much alcohol, the Korsakoff Syndrome. Contrary to popular belief, it's also (goddamnit) not run by AKOV. Imagine a collaboration EP by AKOV, Kove and Koven on Korsakov though. I suggest Korsakoven as a name. Anyway, back to the story.

The next few years saw Korsakov growing further and further, while Elmar started occasionally experimenting with genres outside the DnB realm by dabbling with halftime as Ancient Radius with Multiplex (and later also AKOV, fittingly). In 2018 Korsakov expanded its influence on the scene by also (ugh) becoming a label, helmed by none other than Elmar himself! Right off the bat, their releases were packed with both huge heavy-hitting neurofunk badasses like Teddy Killerz, Gydra or Merikan and more dancefloor-oriented melody wizards like Smooth, Polygon or Feint. They've instantly started releasing so much sick music, they might as well have called the label Korsa-cough! In 2019 Elmar left his old Baromar moniker behind and rebranded himself as ALSO, which he soon realised is very much an ungoogleable name and thus changed it once more to AL/SO. After his honestly awesome Hypersonic debut EP in 2020, in collaboration with man like High Maintenance, he is now back with another collab EP.

This is the part where Sovryn comes in!

You might not know DnB newcomer Sovryn by this new name yet, but you might recognize him from his previous work as Barely Royal. Since around 2014, the Bristolian producer has been making waves in the bass house scene, receiving a lot of support on various radio shows and even by Shogun label boss Friction. However, after a few years he wasn't feeling as inspired by Bass House anymore and wanted a fresh start producing what he always found extremely interesting: You guessed it, Drum and Bass. So he set out to pull back from Barely Royal a bit during 2020 to focus on learning more about DnB productions. During one of the first lockdowns, he spotted a post in a certain big DnB facebook group about a label that wants to showcase music by up-and-coming producers. You guessed it, the guy that posted that was Elmar. Sovryn sent him a few of his tunes that might fit, but Elmar didn't want any of them on the compilation. He wanted them all as a full separate EP! They started working together closely, first to polish that first debut Static Vision EP (which was released a few weeks ago!), then to produce something new together: The Insanity EP!

Enough backstory, time to talk about the music!

The EP kicks off with Fly. By fusing together the superb vocals of Marianna Ray and the insane guitar riffs, licks and other guitar-related words I don't know by Tom Vernon with AL/SO's and Sovryn's catchy dancefloor rhythms, the duo managed to create something really unique here. Honestly, those guitar parts are so damn good it makes me wish every dancefloor track would end with a sick guitar solo like that. Fly manages to be both uplifting and emotional, while not being cheesy or anything. Not that I would mind that. What makes this track a bit more special however, is its backstory. After suffering a tragic loss in his life in 2010, AL/SO locked himself away for a while and processed his emotions by writing a lot of extremely personal and emotional music. Last year, he decided to rework some of these pieces into DnB, with Fly being the first of many to be released. If they are as good as this one, I'm looking forward to every single one of them.

Let's turn the rock levels up another ten notches, on Insanity. Tom Vernon returns once more to showcase the insanity (heh) that is his guitar work, but this time UK-based vocalist Gig Sedgewick also (...) joins the party to lay down some sick rock vocals. Right from the start we become witnesses to the sounds of some heavy guitars that won't leave our side throughout the track. Some real metal stuff. Gig's high-energy punk vocals lead us into the half-time drop, where the electronic dubsteppy growls are battling back and forth against the heavy guitars. After this battle of epic proportions, Gig chimes in with some spoken word vocals to the backdrop of some more atmospheric (for lack of a better word) guitars, which gives the breakdown quite the interesting "live concert" feeling. For the track's climax the duo ups the tempo to full DnB, while still keeping the catchy call-and-response structures of the first drop intact. Not only does this track have a lot of rock charm to it, it's also full of well-executed variations and unique rock-dnb-fusion ideas. I love it. Also, I might be addicted to Tom Vernon's guitars now.

Last but not least we've got Torment, the heavy dancefloor artillery track of the EP. A dreamy intro leads us into a hypnotic rhythm of heavy-hitting hits, intercut with a few glitchy weighty beep and boops here and there to keep things fresh. Before this even has a chance to get stale, the duo gets some more weighty wubs involved to finish this first drop off. In the second drop the hypnotic rhythm from the first half gets the full 4x4 treatment, before smoothly returning back to the weighty wubs once last time.

All in all, awesome stuff. If you enjoy rock elements in your DnB, or if you simply like heavy dancefloor, this is definitely for you.

Other dancefloor things from this week:

Andromedik, Voicians - Won't Let Go (Used Remix)
Koven - Gold (Remixes)
Quinn Karter, Natalie Major - Living In A Dream (Feint Remix)
Aktive - Obey Or Die
Mazare, Keepsake, Liel Kolet - Open Heart

Since it fits here the best, here's also my neuro selection for this week:

Various Artists - Evolutions, Vol. 10 [Blackout Music] | (especially that Cyntax tune)
A.M.C - Eject
Dextems - Watchers / Traces 💎
Gydra - Parasites
Myselor - Eternal Energy
Phace, Buunshin - IDLE

Sources

2. Styke - Lunar EP [Differential Recordings]

Recommended if you like: Lenzman, Alix Perez, Dustkey

Let's relax a little bit.

My next pick comes from the one and only Styke, probably my favourite liquid newcomer from the last few years. The Netherlands-based producer has only started releasing in 2019, but all his releases so far have been so damn good that I'm more hyped about a new Styke release than I would be for a lot of "A-list" liquid producers. All of his EPs so far, whether on Differential, Fokuz Recordings or Eloisa Records, have been truly excellent. I've looped last year's Apology more often than I can count. And he's only 21! So when I saw that he was returning to Differential for a new EP, I was pumped!

I've talked about them before but for those who don't know: Differential is an insanely good dutch up-and-coming label, focused mostly on soulful deep liquid. They've only been around since 2018, but have put out quality release after quality release, I highly recommend them for any liquid fans reading this.

There's not much else I could tell you about Styke, so I'll just go directly to the music, the Lunar EP!

Right from the get-go, Styke is bringing out the chillest of the chill vibes with the piano-driven title track Lunar. I love pianos in my liquid DnB so you can imagine how happy I was when I heard that first note. Put it together with a set of calmly rolling drums, some really warm bass and a vocal sample that is just perfect for the track, and I am simply melting away for the whole 5 minutes and 14 seconds. However, the melting doesn't just stop there. On Retrospect, Styke continues on with a more synth-focused but equally dreamy vibe. Seriously, these synths are way too damn lovely. Once again Styke managed to weave in a great soulful vocal sample into this dreamy soundscape, making it even more beautiful than it already was.

On So Many Things Styke and his track collaborator Brainwork transition over to a bit of a deeper, even more soulful sound. The melodies are more ominous, the bass feels way more wide (for lack of a better word), but it is still such a lovely vibe that I just want to close my eyes and drift away while listening to it. I really love how they used the vocal sample from Musiq Soulchild - Love here, it gives the whole thing another soulful layer on top that I simply adore. Sadly we've arrived at the last track already. On Tough Luck, Styke continues the trajectory into the deepest depths while still keeping the soulful vibes in mind. The drums are chugging along, the bass is loud and deep but most of the time not in-your-face, it's a proper dark roller. While I enjoy the dreamy sounds of its predecessors a bit more, I can still very much appreciate the quality of the production here. Everything feels like it's at the right place at the right time.

I love this EP quite a lot. If you enjoy liquid, deep vibes at all, this is for you. Definitely not a mistyke to listen to this one.

My other (deep) liquid recommendations from this week:

Edlan - Landmarks LP
Sultan + Shepard, The Cut - White Lies (Keeno Remix)
Offline - Ultra Violet EP (now on Spotify!) 💎
Various Artists - Zone 2 [Overview Music] 💎
Visages - Dark Guru EP
Cadense, Sinematic (UK) - Forgive 💎
Lenzman, Slay - Lil Souljah
Degs - Mixtape Sprayout Vol. 2
Pola & Bryson, Ruth Royall - Friend
Athena - Take Flight

3. goddard. - Nicotine [DnB Allstars Records]

Recommended if you like: Chase & Status, Liam Bailey, Bou

While we're in this soulful state of mind, let's talk about the newest goddard. release.

goddard. is one of the big newcomers pushed to the highest heights by scene behemoth DnB Allstars. The London-based producer didn't always release DnB though, he actually started out as a house and techno producer around 2016, with his GODDARD alias. He eventually also became the label boss of Culture Records and even started becoming involved in his very own Eccentric Events series around 2018. Around the same time, he teamed up with Ross Quinn to produce some quite interesting downtempo music as "ag." (gotta love artist names with dots at the end). While he saw some success with this artistic venture, including a few radio plays on BBC Introducing, he eventually decided to focus on DnB and changed his artist name to the lower-case dot version of his name in 2019. He put out a few tunes on his own, with pecking order even gaining support by Hospital Records bossman London Elektricity, before he got involved with DnB Allstars and started from scratch in 2020.

I'm not sure I even need to introduce DnB Allstars at this point. They started out as a clip-sharing social media page for Drum and Bass in 2017 and have since then very quickly become the biggest "general DnB content" page on pretty much all platforms. Some people even credit them with the Rise Of The Foghorn™. Or blame them for it, depending on your viewpoint. In 2019 they started their own DnB Allstars Records label to push underground DnB to the masses of followers they have accumulated. While they obviously favour the "newschool UK" sound a lot, they have also put out quite a few interesting and unique tracks in the last two years. While I'm not always a huge fan of everything they do, their impact is undeniable. As a label they have massively contributed to the rise of some really talented new faces, with the likes of AC13, Alcemist and, well, goddard. probably being the most well-known ones. Fun fact: I rewrote that sentence multiple times just so I wouldn't have goddard's dot at the end of the sentence.

This newest single by goddard. is called Nicotine and it is definitely one of my favourite from both him and the label. The Chase & Status vibes are so strong in this track that you don't even need to look at his interviews to know that they have always been a major influence on his sound. One of the big reasons for that association is the incredible soulful vocal, which is either from the best vocal pack ever, for some reason uncredited or sung by himself. Either way, the raspy powerful performance is perfect for this track. The stripped-back production gives plenty of space for the vocal to shine, but still pushes the energy at all the right moments. The more I listen to it, the more I appreciate how well the rolling drum breaks and the unique bass work together with it all. Honestly, I could probably loop it all day and wouldn't get bored of it. Nicotine is one of those tunes that has the potential to be played in mainstream radio, while not being a sell-out kind of tune.

This track is my Nicotine. Proper addicted to this one.

If you liked this, you might also like:

Millbrook, Selin - You & Me
33 Below, MCK - Burning
Agressor Bunx - Lethal Rain

... it's a bit hard to recommend anything because the track is so unique. It's just a list of unique deep vibes with the occasional vocal.