Picks Of The Week (11.02.23

1. Metanoia - Clockwork [Blackout Music]

Recommended if you like: Smooth, DC Breaks, Maysev

Mhh, I don't think I've ever heard of that name before. Oh, and the music is sick too? That's gotta be this week's Hidden Gem Of The Week™️! Well, technically yes, but also not really.

While there is someone hiding behind the alias, which would give the label some newfound additional layers of meaning, you would probably agree that the artist involved is basically the opposite of hidden: It's none other than the Slovenian genre chameleon himself, Luka Smooth! As you might remember from my previous couple reviews about his recent output, he is no stranger to Neurofunk, be it with the likes of State Of Mind or DC Breaks or, well, on his own, so a project of his releasing on Blackout Music again really isn't that surprising. While his solo production time is nowadays mostly taken up by his hard work on his upcoming album (I hope), he still had some energy left for collaborative ventures, especially now that the Telekinesis project with Markoman is put on hold. However, while the one duo project stopped, another one was already in the making. After a couple of years of working together with fellow Slovenian up-and-coming producer Wooga behind the scenes, with the only piece of information available to us until the beginning of this year being "it's coming", they are now ready to unleash their brand new alias onto the scene: You guessed it, it's Metanoia! But wait, who is this Wooga fellow?

Maribor-based producer Sven "Wooga" Vuga has been slowly but surely establishing himself in the scene since around 2018, when he became part of the Bass Fighters collective, strengthening the Slovenian scene one gig at a time. However, he wasn't just interested in performing other people's music, he was also deeply invested in creating some bangers himself! While unleashing some sick basslines as the bass guitarist for Progressive Rock / Metal / I-don't-know-these-genres-well band Apoptosis, he was also working on some good ol' DnB on the side, with releases on RollingThru, Dropamine and Citrus. After technically debuting the Metanoia project in mid-2022, or at least the DJing part of it, it is now finally time for its actual debut release, the double single Clockwork!

We begin our two-stop journey with our title tik-tik-track, Clockwork, smoothly crossing the bridge from Smooth's often punchy yet cheeky melodic Neuro steppers to this new combined sound incorporating some of the Wooga Aruba sugar into the mix. Man, it's harder to find good rhymes with Wooga than I thought. Anyway. Not only is the result incredibly cinematic, with the duo building up the intro atmosphere up so much that it even includes goosebump-inducing choirs at one point, it's also just bursting with fun little details, rhythm switchups and great moments, keeping any listener on their toes all the way through. Every time you think, ah yes, I've figured these guys out, they pull the rug out from underneath you and suddenly you're faced with a drop fake-out, in which a rapid-fire 8th note bass machinegun hypes you up to a whole 'nother level, followed by countless of fast-paced drum variations that are just so satisfying that you'll get withdrawals as soon as the drop is over. Speaking from experience over here.

Anecdotal evidence aside, let's get Empirical! Now that we've crossed the bridge over from the stompy, steppy bangers to the other side, the duo is taking us down a path we haven't heard from either of them before. During the last bits of the intro of truly, for lack of a better word, epic proportions, full of big war drums, incredible strings and vocals that go straight into your heart, we can already tell that there's something huge yet entirely otherworldly coming. Just one more drumroll and we're assaulted by these almost overwhelming shots of pure sound that just keep on coming at you, while being deeply intertwined with the heavily syncopated breaks, resulting in rapid variations in intensity. I honestly don't even know how I would react to this one at a rave, I would probably just be wondering if actual aliens were coming to abduct me or something. Absolutely crazy tune.

Every couple of months, like clockwork one might say, Smooth just keeps on nonchalantly dropping huge tunes and he's definitely continuing this trend with these two new ones. However, thanks to Wooga bringing a ton of truly fresh ideas to the project, the cinematic quality, heaviness and uniqueness are off the charts this time around. These two seem to bring out the best in each other. I'm pumped to see what places this project will go in the future. Other than into my playlists, of course.

Other Neurofunk from this week:

Teddy Killerz - Backup
Kevala - Chaos / Shadow Work 💎
Subcat - Hyenas 💎
Jojo Dudovski - Stays On 💎

2. DRZ - Better Off, The EP [PullUp Recordings]

Recommended if you like: Refracta, Intercept, Alora

It's no secret I'm not much of a Jump Up guy. And not even because of the various strange communities surrounding it (although that definitely doesn't help), the music itself just doesn't click as often for me. Every now and then, however, an artist comes along and does something differently. DRZ is one of these for me.

Behind the three-lettered acronym (or abbreviation or initialism or contraction or whatever) is Reading-based up-and-comer Matthew Montgomery. It might not seem like it, but it was only a couple of years ago that Matthew started DJing at local clubs in the Brighton area, between going to classes at Sussex Uni. Or not going, I don't know his life. Either way, wanting to expand his musical talents, he started producing during one of the first lockdowns in 2020. Just a bit more than a year later, he had already put together his very first 100% DRZ mix, full of unreleased and/or unsigned new original goodness. Somehow, not even 3 years later, he has already put out his sixth edition of said series. But don't worry, he isn't just producing so he can put tunes into these mixes, his diverse talents have also been quickly identified by all kinds of labels, resulting in releases on both the more jumpy corner of the scene like Audio Addict, Kingpin or DnB Allstars RAW and the more techy platforms like Debunked and Surveillance Music.

Just from this list of labels you can already tell there's something interesting going on: in these past few years some of the newer jump up heads have been innovating like crazy, incorporating completely different sounds into the "standard UK jump up sound", slowly but surely increasing my interest in the subgenre to a level where I'm actually looking forward to new stuff from these artists and labels.

Yes, labels too. PullUp Recordings, the outlet this new DRZ EP is being released on, is actually one of the best examples for what I mean. Founded only in 2018, the Cardiff-based PullUp lads went from just being a name slapped on one of the founder's 19th birthday party to a brand that's hosting full stages at festivals in less time than it took me to write this sentence. Okay, maybe a little more time than that. But not much! Sam Southan, the one whose birthday it was, and John Lewis, who came in a bit later and helped scale things up considerably, had always planned on focusing on the events side for a couple years first, however, the funniest thing happened. Instead, they redirected their energy to becoming a full-blown label!

After narrowly avoiding launching under the name Roadblock Records, they pulled themselves together and finally launched PullUp Recordings in 2020. With the help of Olli from Kingpin, they once again insanely quickly went from putting out some proper banging free downloads to a whole bunch of paid releases regularly storming the Juno downloads charts, earning them a whole bunch of numero unos in the process. All throughout this, they and their roster, including the likes of BSEARL, Temple, SMG, James Hiraeth and recent best newcomer nominee Bennie, underwent a transformation from a mostly minimalistic jump up sound to something that pulls from all corners of DnB, slowly but surely pushing themselves onto my list of labels to watch.

To give you a taste of what you can expect from this newschool sound, let's finally take a look at DRZ's new 6-track EP, the Better Off, The EP EP! A name that just rolls off the tongue and fits into any sentence structure! As fate would have it, we kick things off with the half-titular banger Better Off, featuring fellow up-and-comer Hal. It's no coincidence either, as this was basically the humongous stone that got this whole project rolling in the first place. Dropped 6 months before the full EP, i.e. so far in advance that I don't think they had even planned for more than this one track at the time, the elegant weaving of various newschool sonics present on this track had gotten so much support and shown so much staying power over the following months, eventually even becoming the biggest track of DRZ's Spotify career (so far), it absolutely deserves the honour of having a whole EP structured around it.

After the opener's precise arrangement of bonkers synth stabs, effective vocal chops and various rhythmic components showed us the kind of production value to expect, we delve deeper with Losing My Mind, this time featuring fellow PullUp veteran BSEARL. While similar to its predecessor in some parts, most notably the vibey vocal sample and the synth dissonances poking your brain in ways you might not have experienced yet, this follow-up does go into a more straight-forward bouncy (emphasis on bou) UK vibe direction.

Next up we've got Reasons pulling us down into some proper deep depths, with relentlessly forward-pushing drums going haywire, a massive yet groovy bassline overwhelming the senses and a vocal sample giving it that stylish finishing touch. While staying firmly in the whole deep and dark vibe we've now established, Loveless pumps the brakes on some of Reason's wilder elements, from the warm bass now mostly bubbling underneath everything else to the drums rolling in a more straight-forward manner, resulting in a more soulful atmosphere overall.

Don't get too comfortable though, as our next stop Downfall makes use of all the saved up power, bundling it all up into one huge wall of pure energy, with only the minimal drums interjecting a couple of times to rattle you free from your paralysis and another perfectly chosen vocal sample pushing the vibes to the maximum level. Finishing this roundhouse kick of moods is EP closer and summer anthem Rock My World, effortlessly lobbing a couple balls of dreamy synths back and forth on top of a rather minimalistic beat, putting smiles on faces everywhere it's played.

Great EP full of all sorts of surprising sounds, all kinds of punchy production and all forms of fabolously forward-thinking frequencies. If this is the direction Jump Up is going in, count me the hell in.

Similar vibes from this week:

Emzhi - First Light 💎
NCT - There For U
Noisia - The Resonance V
En:vy - Neo EP
Phonetick - Butterfly 💎