It's been twenty years since William Beven's cataclysmic entry to the music world. "South London Burroughs" in 2005, and the two albums released after it - "Bural" (2006) and "Untrue" (2007) have since become the stuff of modern day folklore. With countless 'best of ' accolaides, university-grade dissections and deep dives into the producer's process, and, of course, the famous Sun article to uncover his then-anonymous identity.

Since those monumental long players, the producer's sole focus has been EPs and occassional collaborations, with a (general) trend of veering futher and further away from the  FWD>> and Plastic People flavoured dancefloors that were his main inspiration. It is in such grounds we find "Comafields" and "Imaginary Festival". 

"Comafields" opens with droning bass, eerie arps and rising noise; with the producer's trademark ghosted vox tentetively appearing through various moments of the mix. Eventually, remnants of a rhythm appear through smudged kick drums and his coke-can hats smeared into audio obscurity. (Typically) conversely for the producer, the track seems able to impart both tension and release on the listener at the same time, and is a highly evocative and expansive sonic futurescape. 

"Imaginary Festival" begins in similarly hesitant form. Echoes of Burialesque rhytthms pepper the background of the mix, while more of his unique auto-tune occassionally mutters a brief melody motif. Slowly, degragmented rave riffs enter the environment, only to drop out again as quickly as they appears. It's a stuttered, stop-star listen, a theme we've seen throughout his discography. One for the headphones on cold rainy nights through the city. I don't think anyone sonically depicts inner city melancholy and radioactive warmth like Burial. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Veering deeper into experimentation and atmospheres rather than your straight up garage tracks, William Bevan celebrates 20 years at the cutting edge of sonic adventuring with a fresh new double headed 12".

TRACK LISTING

A. Comafields 12:03
AA. Imaginary Festival 10:45

‘Slapped By My Life’ is a bittersweet paean to Jessy's husband. Musically it leans into a more dancefloor-oriented sound, playful and floaty at a speedy 158bpm. The ‘Existential Edit’ version pushes even further onto the dancefloor, accentuating the sweeping, lush synth textures with just accents and phrases that give it a propulsive bounce.Lyrically, it flits between open love, gratefulness and uncertainty, and is the most simple, direct and personal thing Jessy has ever written, made with co-production from Pearson sound.

TRACK LISTING

1. Slapped By My Life
2. Slapped By My Life (Existential Edit)
3. Limbo (Staying Home Dub)
4. Midnight Ontario (Waterfall Dub)

DJ Haram's debut album 'Beside Myself' is about the survival of the spirit in day to day struggle. Following on from her collaboration with Moor Mother as 700 Bliss on 'Nothing to Declare', here she is joined by a swarm of collaborators, collectively navigating pain and rage, and in occasional moments of joyful respite, mocking the strife. Haram describes herself as a “multidisciplinary propagandist, contemporary anti-authoritarian Arab, gendered labor class, god fearing atheist” who makes “anti-format, audio propaganda, anti-lifestyle, immersive sonics”. Her music attests to this, as she brings in friends and collaborators, from MC's Armand Hammer, Bbymutha, SHA RAY, Moor Mother, and Dakn, through to co-producers August Fanon, Egyptian producer El Kontessa, and Jersey Club producer Kay Drizz, trumpeter Aquiles Navarro, and guitarist Abdul Hakim Bilal. It's immediately identifiable as her work, but simultaneously unclassifiable, finding equal space in its dusty live production for Jersey Club, punk noise, Central Asian and Middle Eastern Percussion, synths, 808's and lurking, rumbling bass. Often central to this is her own performance of unflinching sorrowful verses, comparable to the poets Audrey Lorde or Ai in tone and Kim Gordon in context, examining the material and the abstract in equal measure. Her grungy futurism offers no easy resolutions, yet the drama and catharsis it presents is rarely so defiantly delivered.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Clattering percussion, glitched vocals and walls of tense synths coalesce into something that's both wildly expressive and deeply rooted in club and live music culture. A perfect mix of experimental hip-hop, noise and electronica.

TRACK LISTING

1. Walking Memory
2. Remaining Ft. Dakn & Aquiles Navarro
3. Fishnets Ft. Bbymutha & Sha Ray & August Fanon
4. Lifelike Ft. Moor Mother & 700 Bliss
5. Voyeur
6. Do U Love Me Ft. Kayy Drizz
7. Stenography Ft. Armand Hammer
8. IDGAF Ft. Abdul Hakim Bilal
9. Badass Ft. Carmen Nebula
10. Loneliness Epidemic
11. Sahel Ft. El Kontessa
12. Distress Tolerance
13. Who Needs Enemies When These Are Your Allies?
14. Deep Breath (An Ending)

What we said in 2006:

"London's Burial issues this belated overview of his career to date on Hyperdub, including the definitive 'Spaceape' and other formative dubstep and grime highlights. It encompasses the myriad of styles which have followed and continue to manifest themselves after UK garages's implosion. Universally acclaimed as one of the best, most ground-breaking releases of 2006."

TRACK LISTING

1. Untitled
2. Distant Lights
3. Spaceape (featuring The Spaceape)
4. Wounder
5. Night Bus
6. Southern Comfort
7. U Hurt Me
8. Gutted
9. Forgive
10. Broken Home
11. Prayer
12. Pirates
13. Untitled

'Demilitarize' follows Nazar’s remarkable 2020 debut 'Guerrilla', which reprocessed Angolan kuduro music with rough textures, field recordings and media clips, telling a personal story of the civil war that exiled his family to Europe, while his father, a rebel General, fought a losing battle in the jungle back home. After 'Guerrilla', and an extended period of serious illness, now 'Demilitarize' is motivated by a reckoning with mortality and the flowering of new love, turning the ‘rough kuduro’ of 'Guerrilla' inside out.This is a deep sound world, genuinely dreamy, the arc of the album describing shedding the armour of trauma and surrendering to this new situation. A constant and unexpected aspect of 'Demilitarize' is Nazar's gentle, submerged vocal. Insistent and mantra-like, it’s like a cross between Elisabeth Frazer, Arthur Russell and Frank Ocean, and the music is fragile and opaque in response. The rhythms of kuduro are still here,but move around his voice like fish around a swimmer, while precise sound design illuminates from different angles. Chords spiral, ripple and shoot through the beats giving tracks the loosest of settings; songs disassemble; vocals float off-centre.

TRACK LISTING

1. Core
2. Anticipate
3. War Game
4. Mantra
5. Unlearn
6. Disarm
7. Open
8. Safe
9. Heal
10. DMZ

Burial and Kode9’s acclaimed joint 12”, initially released as a Hyperdub webshop exclusive in summer 2024, now available in record stores worldwide, with revised label art and custom sleeve.

TRACK LISTING

A. Burial – Phoneglow
AA. Kode9 - Eyes Go Blank

This collaboration between Spanish producer Nueen and Manc vocalist / rapper Iceboy Violet - who has previously sprinkled their magic dust across Hyperdub releases from aya and Loraine James - traces the arc of a four year relationship, memorialising its highs and documenting its lows, processing, reflecting, and then ending with the ecstatic spark of new love. It’s a magical, intimate and heartfelt album, sometimes anguished but often enchanting. Nueen's music responds with foggy, but richly detailed, production. Smudgy drill-laced beats contrast with curdled, spiralling chords, at times drawing out a malevolent ambience. ‘You Said You'd Hold My Hand Through The Fire’ is an immensely affecting and lucid album, powerfully wrought, ultimately hopeful.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Heartbreak Of A Broken Stitch (ft Harriet Morley)
A2. SM_FID
A3. Everything Ends With An Inhale
A4. Cement Skin
A5. Pixel Petals
A6. Slammd (Interlude)
A7. Closer
B1. Terrence’s Time Bomb
B2. Fragmentary (Eraser)
B3. Inside My Head (Interlude)
B4. Still (ft Dawuna)
B5. Fawning (Interlude)
B6. Kiss Me Again (6am In Helsinki) (ft Bennettiscoming)

Heavee is a Queer Chicagoan DJ & producer with a long history in footwork. His 2022 'Audio Assault' EP on Hyperdub showcased synth-driven, melodic footwork, but ‘Unleash’ goes much further into audio world-building, with a fresh, spongy and citrus-y sound palette and rich, bright chord sequences.

It's minimal, airy, balancing light and dark, sometimes breezy and sometimes clinical. Heavee works simultaneously outside and inside the box, rebuilding footwork's framework and vibe to his own unique specification. Rhythmically, it's dance floor ready, using footwork's 160 template as a springboard for building new drum sounds to express these rhythms, and draws from R&B, rap, jazz and grime, with a sprinkling of bitter-sweet vintage Detroit techno.

‘Unleash’ takes footwork’s “eats all” approach to music and leads it in a fresh direction with a freedom of spirit. It's a strong addition to the footwork cannon and shows that experiments in dance music can be fun.

TRACK LISTING

A1. StarSeeker
A2. Unlock
A3. SearchN 4 Ft Babii
A4. Bang Bang
A5. Can U Feel It
A6. Bounce Dat Ft PayPal & DanTOG
B1. Unleash
B2. See The Sun
B3. Whiplash
B4. Sumthin Different
B5. Heart Fragments
B6. Work Me
B7. Make It Work
B8. Smoke Break Ft Homesiick & Takuya Nakamura

On 'Models', Lee Gamble liberates sonic spectres to inform a suite of illusory anthems, subliming vulnerable, half-remembered fragments of dream pop, Soundcloud rap and trance in the process. Sung by cybernetic voices in an almost wordless language, his widescreen memories reverberate across the last few decades of pop history, smudging Elizabeth Frazer's surreal poetry into disembodied diva cries and Lil Uzi Vert's abstract, AutoTuned mumbles. Extracting haunted fragments of synthetic corrupted chatter and indecipherable non-words to sculpt dreamy pop simulacrums, Gamble takes the concept of the pop producer to its logical extreme; examining how intonation and language is engineered to monopolise our attention, his magical inversion of pop playing like a bewitching symphony of earworms.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Purple, Orange
A2. Juice
A3. XIth C. Spray
A4. She’s Not
B1. Phantom Limb
B2. Blurring
B3. Your Weight On My Arms

‘Gentle Confrontation’, Loraine James's third Hyperdub album, opens a new chapter of her real and sonic life in which she examines her past and present. It's a positively languid, enjoyably disjointed set made while listening to her teenage favourites; math rock and emo-electronic such as DNTEL, Lusine and Telefon Tel Aviv. The album also features an ever more diverse set of peers, placing them in her unusual musical settings and drawing out sensitive and reflexive performances. At other times the album stretches out into a drifting ambience as if seeking a sense of bliss in the everyday. ‘Gentle Confrontation’ is about relationships (especially familial), understanding, and giving back a little grace and care, while the tone of the record criss-crosses watery ambience with denatured rhythm and asmr beats. These 16 tracks are Loraine's best work yet, and a personal and musical leap forward, delivering a totally unique vision of electronic pop music.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: The inimitable Loraine James effortlessly mixes languid lounge jazz, scattered electronics and woozy downbeat on her third album for veteran electronic superlabel, Hyperdub. It's full of melodic hooks, submerged under a wash of beautifully produced electronic soup, and it's my favourite thing she's done by far. Brilliant.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Gentle Confrontation
A2. 2003
A3. Let U Go Ft. KeiyaA
A4. Déjà Vu Ft. RiTchie
B1. Prelude Of Tired Of Me
B2. Glitch The System (Glitch Bitch 2)
B3. I DM U
B4. One Way Ticket To The Midwest (Emo) Ft. Corey Mastrangelo
C1. Cards With The Grandparents
C2. While They Were Singing Ft. Marina Herlop
C3. Try For Me Ft. Eden Samara
C4. Tired Of Me
D1. Speechless Ft. George Riley
D2. Disjointed (Feeling Like A Kid Again)
D3. I’m Trying To Love Myself
D4. Saying Goodbye Ft. Contour

(CD BONUS TRACK : Scepticism With Joy Ft. Mouse On The Keys)

On 'Love Hallucination' Jessy Lanza is in control as a songwriter and producer, flexing her skills in the studio and rebuilding her sound, taking chances with production and energy in all directions, from club-ready, to downbeat and sultry, with the theme of trusting yourself in the moment and using intuition as a compass driving the record forward. ‘Love Hallucination’ is the sound of an artist in bloom, an album of big emotions and big songs, with direct, personal lyrics, such as the upbeat but panicked opener 'Don't Leave Me Now' and the 2-step drama of 'Midnight Ontario', or 'Limbo', an ear worm disco stomper about produced with Marco 'Tensnake' Niermeski. Also featured as co-producers are David Kennedy (Pearson Sound), adding slick arrangements for the club, long-time collaborator Jeremy Greenspan (Junior Boys), and Paul White. ‘Love Hallucination’ is a bold and immediate record from Jessy Lanza, her most clear, authentic and best to date.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Jessy Lanza brings us her most flamboyant, widescreen release yet, with soaring synths and scattered percussion beautifully brought together into a startlingly modern soundclash of R&B, synth-pop and driven dancefloor electronica. A big stylistic leap forwards for Lanza, and another banger for one of the best labels in the alt 'tronica business.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Don’t Leave Me Now
A2. Midnight Ontario
A3. Limbo
A4. Casino Niagara
A5. Don’t Cry On My Pillow
B1. Big Pink Rose
B2. Drive
B3. I Hate Myself
B4. Gossamer
B5. Marathon
B6. Double Time

700 Bliss is the forward-thinking duo of DJ Haram and Moor Mother. Their first full length for Hyperdub is an album of noise rap that ties together the raw edges of club music and hip hop with punk energy, jazz, house-party catharsis, percussion-heavy analogue sound design, and cheeky skits, ranging from experimental rap tracks with rolling hi hats and lyrical bravado, to poetry set to noise and sound collage.

Moor Mother and DJ Haram started collaborating in 2014 and eventually formed 700 Bliss, a blistering live act in Philly's DIY scene, releasing their 2018 debut, Spa 700 on Halcyon Veil / Don Giovanni Records. Since that time, both artists have grown global followings. Moor Mother is a prolific solo artist and collaborator, writer, and member of Black Quantum Futurism while Haram has been curating and creating radio shows, DJing, and producing (including an EP for Hyperdub in 2019).

‘Nothing To Declare’ is a smart, danceable revelation, a chiseled soundscape of dive bombing bass, piercing bleeps, crunchy distortion, and wavering synth lines. Welcoming in a variety of voices from their extended, cross-genre scene, 700 Bliss also bring along a cast of collaborators, including vocalists Orion Sun, Lawfandah, Ase Manual, and Ali Logout (from the band Special Interest), plus Palestinian producer Muqata'a, and writer M Téllez who delivers a surreal sci fi monologue over a pounding kick drum on ‘More Victories’.

‘Nothing To Declare’ is a deeply layered rewriting of hip hop and electronic music that gives more with each listen. You won't hear another rap album like it in 2022.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Nothing To Declare
A2. Totally Spies Ft Lafawndah
A3. Nightflame Ft Orion Sun
A4. Anthology
A5. Discipline
A6. BlessGrips
A7. Easyjet
A8. Candace Parker Ft Muqata’a
B1. No More Kings
B2. Capitol Ft Alli Logout
B3. Sixteen
B4. Spirit Airlines
B5. Crown
B6. More Victories Ft M. Téllez
B7. Seven
B8. Lead Level 15 Ft Ase Manual

‘Escapology’ - Kode9's first album since 2015's ‘Nothing’ – is the first audio document of a wider project, Astro-Darien, ongoing since last year. His most ambitious work yet as a multi-disciplinary artist, ‘Escapology’ is the soundtrack album to the sonic fiction Astro-Darien, which will be released in October on Hyperdub sub-label Flatlines.The music reconfigures Astro-Darien's tense, off-world atmospheres into slices of high definition, asymmetric club rhythms, woven through thrilling sound design and vertiginous sonics.‘Escapology’ is just one entry point into of the Astro-Darien universe, which had begun to surface in 2021 as a two-week audiovisual installation on the main dance floor at club space Corsica Studios in South London, and as a multi-channel diffusion on the 50 speaker Acousmonium at the invitation of INA-GRM in Paris, the institution founded in 1951 by the musique concrète pioneer Pierre Schaeffer, composer Pierre Henry and the engineer Jacques Poullin. The artwork for both ‘Escapology’ and Astro-Darien was produced by Kode9’s long-time collaborators Lawrence Lek (digital world design), and Optigram (typography and gfx). 

TRACK LISTING

01. Trancestar North
02. The Break Up
03. Toxic Foam
04. Orbex
05. Angle Of Re-Entry
06. Freefall
07. In The Shadow Of Ben Hope
08. Sim-Darien
09. Cross The Gap
10. Uncoil
11. Astro-Darien
12. Lagrange Point
13. Docking
14. Torus
15. T-Divine

"Antidawn" marks the return of Burial - our nation's beloved shadow dweller, emo-garage innovator and cultishly adored bass producer. After nearly 2 decades unravelling the mystery - with countless breakdowns, assessments and even dissertations written about how the artist composes and records his music - William Bevan had decided it's time for a further redux.

Reducing the sound to just vapours, the record 'explores an interzone between dislocated, patchwork songwriting and eerie, open-world game-space ambience', which perfectly puts into context what you have in front of you. Like walking through Skyrim's metaverse loaded up on dissociatives  and ketamine, there's no real linear structure to the album. As usual, snips, sounds and textures take precedent, but it's the silences and the spaces BETWEEN the snips that Burial has really emphasized on "Antidawn". There's a movement created with sparseness - a change of feeling; a beckoning towards the light through tense and dark realms.

Encapsulated in a frozen, urban Winter; there's movements of painful sadness, juxtaposed between bursts of radioactive warmth as whispers of forgotten angels drift in on FM radio interference. It's quintessential Burial - crackles n static n all - but occupying a space that couldn't be further from the dancefloor. If his more recent 12"s have hinted at this wandering, non-linear, long-walk-home approach then on "Antidawn" we're lost & abandoned in the multidimensional realities of the present; with little reassurance that 'everything’s going to be ok'...

It's as breathtaking and awe-inspiring as you'd expect from the UK demigod yet brittle, fragile, constricted and smothered in darkness. It's really nice to see him explore these realms and while thousands of his online bloggers and trolls will no doubt have countless critiques on his development; I for one am well on board.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Burial heads even further down the cold, long & lonely road into almost pure isolation. Like walking through Skyrim's metaverse loaded up on dissociatives it's a completely transportive, if fragile and desolate listen.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Strange Neighbourhood [11:04]
A2. Antidawn [08:43]

B1. Shadow Paradise [10:20]
B2. New Love [07:13]
B3. Upstairs Flat [06:07]

Lee Gamble completes his ‘Flush Real Pharynx 2019-2021’ album cycle with ‘A Million Pieces Of You’, the third EP of a triptych written in a time when the subjective experience of overload came to a halt, giving way to an overbearing sense of loss, burnout and a desperate need for hope. These seven tracks feel more reflective, more human than the two preceeding EPs; the serpentine dopplers and seductive supercar engines of ‘In A Paraventral Scale’, and imploding motion sculptures of ‘Exhaust’. A deepfake of Lee’s voice appears from the chaotic slow-mo crash of ‘Balloon Lossy’, timidly telling of “[garbled]… good news”. The uncanny spectre of deep fakes, AI and deep learning models give way to the melancholic loneliness of the solo piano in ‘Empty Middle Seat’. Then glimmering, golden pads on ‘Hyperpassive’ slowly crawl into the hopeful, bright arpeggiations of ‘Balloon Copy’. ‘A Million Pieces Of You’ is a ride through a part-synthetic, part-modelled, part-imitation, part-taught, part-human, part[1]hopeful, part-reflective and paradoxically affirmative space – an involuntarily fitting finale to an album originally conceived in a world different to the one we now inhabit.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Lee Gamble continues to lead the way in terms of experimental electronics and post-everything nightclub deconstructions. A bit mellower in parts than some of his recent outings, it's nonetheless an arresting and encompassing listen throughout.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Balloon Lossy
A2. Newtown Got Folded
A3. Obsession Model
A4. Empty Middle Seat
B1. You Left A Space
B2. Hyperpassive
B3. Balloon Cop

‘Flush Real Pharynx 2019-2021’ is a three-part album from composer, producer and DJ Lee Gamble. Written over three years, and comprised of three seperate EPs, their individual releases unintentionally frame and timestamp a turbulent period. Across 77 minutes the full collection imparts a seamless tour through its three phases. File under #GullyAutomatedHyperConcrète.

“If the most widely available music is also the most easily digestible, then it is no wonder that artists like Gamble are so keen to grapple with music’s purpose beyond entertainment—to be an art form in fierce dialogue with the present.” (Pitchfork)

“This music gives form to the smart cities and networked realities of the 21st century … a thrilling meditation on the weirdness of now.” (Resident Advisor)

TRACK LISTING

01. Fata Morgana
02. Folding
03. Moscow
04. BMW Shuanghuan X5
05. Chant
06. In The Wreck Room
07. Many Gods, Many Angels
08. CREAM
09. Envenom
10. Glue
11. Naja
12. Tyre
13. Switches
14. Shards
15. Saccades
16. Balloon Lossy
17. Newtown Got Folded
18. Obsession Model
19. Empty Middle Seat
20. You Left A Space
21. Hyperpassive
22. Balloon Copy

Proc Fiskal's second album sees a reorientation of the source elements of his music. Where "Insula" fed off samples of the ramblings of his friends and sounds of his hometown, "Siren Spine Sysex" is laden with an inner voice of sampled Gaelic, Irish and English folk music, contorted and imbued into the futurist body of modern pop; the ghostly anima image of the female folk voice and the lamenting wheeze of the accordion rub against the rush of icey 808s and angles of grime. Joe Powers’ family history is in folk music, with several of his forebears active in the Scottish Folk revival of the 1960s. It's this cultural baggage - the Caledonian Antisyzygy of the earnest folk tradition he was raised in – alongside the modernist dance music he makes, that brings a personal element to the album. The music of "Siren Spine Sysex" examines dance music as folk music, re-routing them both comparatively, with the wordless emoting of chopped and screwed Gaelic vocals leading to joyous pop songs like "8 Mgapixel See Thru Phone" and "Leith Tornn Carnal". Though fast and detailed, "Siren Spine Sysex" feels relaxed and pastoral at times, its edits and drums sensual, swelling, and reactive to the music, its textures influenced by the tinny 16 bit flutes, strings, and wacky scores of gaming soundtracks.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Simply WOW. His first album was incredible and this one's taken it even higher! Casually dropping between half-tempo, luminescent breaks and plasma dub; there's no one who can conjure up the gooey, ketty daydreams that fizz and slurp like Proc. Beautifully radioactive intergalactic angel music. #LIKEx100

TRACK LISTING

A1. Anti Chessst
A2. Convaerge Iana
A3. Humancargoe Estt
A4. Recall (Throate Achres)
B1. Met Path Thoth
B2. 8 Mgapixel See Thru Phone
B3. Thurs Jung Youtz
C1. Her In
C2. The Most Beautiful Irish Song
C3. Leith Tornn Carnal
D1. Auld Peop
D2. Iaosiphsean Powers
D3. God Aed
D4. Roman Fatigue

‘Medieval Femme’, Fatima Al Qadiri’s new ten track suite inspired by the classical poems of Arab women, invokes a daydream through the metaphor of an Islamic garden, at the border between depression and desire, where the present temporarily dissolves, leaving only past and future. Mixing neon drones and the faint outlines of Arabesque melody, ‘Medieval Femme’ reveals a fully-realised, dreamlike setting, shaded with colour and subtle friction. Conveying a thematic state of melancholic longing, Fatima seeks to transport the listener to a place of reverie and desolation, to question the line between two seemingly opposite states and rejoice in celestial sorrow. ‘Medieval Femme’ takes instrumentation from music of the Middle Ages, recast in a futuristic setting; soft-synth lutes, organs and pipes reverberate in space while gauzy pulses ripple in response. Fatima's vocals of repeated, mantra-like phrases are sometimes pitched and altered, drawing out increasingly intense peaks, angelic choruses and yearning incantations. On ‘Tasakuba’, Kaltham Jassim’s recitation of a couplet from the 7th century poet Al-Khansa', the sorrow of her words are given a turbulent, hallucinatory setting, before the album resolves on the final song, the limpid, airy ‘Zandaq’.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: I'm loving all these hybrids of neo-classical, bass and ancient music that seem to be coming out right now. File next to: Doon Kanda, Faten Kanaan, Lee Gamble etc. Mega!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Medieval Femme
A2. A Certain Concubine
A3. Sheba
A4. Vanity
A5. Stolen Kiss Of A Succubus
B1. Golden
B2. Qasmuna (Dreaming)
B3. Malaak
B4. Tasakuba
B5. Zandaq

Foodman is Takahide Higuchi, from Nagoya, in central Japan. After remixing Jessy Lanza’s ‘Alexander’ last year, ‘Yasuragi Land’ is his first release for Hyperdub, alive with Footwork-inspired musical freedom and the sense that everything is a rhythm.Unusually, ‘Yasuragi Land’ has no bass. Instead, the album is breezy and refined; hyper-rhythmic music, made with a few simple tools, dances around your head. ‘Yasuragi’ and ‘Parking Area’ feel like gently deconstructed acoustic jazz, while ‘Ari Ari’ is deep house splattered with a cartoonish hiccup.

‘Hoshikzu Tenboudai’ and ‘Shiboritate’ bounce around the speakers like trance-inducing polyrhythmic updates of the New York minimalists, programmed past human limits. ‘Food Court’ is busy with mechanical rhythm and naive melodies, ‘Gallery Café’ pairs a cute wooden flute melody with micro edited wooden drums, ‘Michi No Eki’ is like a digital take on Magma's complex rock, and ‘Sanbashi’ indirectly approximates 80s R&B. The album ends on ‘Misyuku’, with a treated guitar lick sounding like it was stolen from Daft Punk, woven into dense interlacing drums.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Omiyage
A2. Yasuragi
A3. Michi No Eki Ft Taigen Kawabe
A4. Ari Ari
A5. Shiboritate
A6. Hoshikuzu Tenboudai
A7. Shikaku No Sekai
B1. Food Court
B2. Gallery Café
B3. Numachi
B4. Parking Area
B5. Iriguchi
B6. Aji Fly
B7. Sanbashi Ft Cotto Center
B8. Minsyuku

Made during summer 2020, Loraine James’ second Hyperdub album, ‘Reflection’, is a turbulent expression of inner-space, laid out in unflinching honesty, offering gentle empathy and bitter-sweet hope. ‘Reflection’ further develops a unique pop sensibility realised on last year’s ‘Nothing EP’, while tones of Drill and R&B seep through into this collection too. In contrast to the brash splashes of 2019’s ‘For You And I’ LP and the grimey anger of ‘Nothing’, ‘Reflection’ is pared-down and confident, taking the listener through how last year felt as a young black queer woman in a world that has suddenly stopped moving, the arc of the album peppered with Loraine's diaristic confessions.

Starting positively with the gentle pop-trap of ‘Built To Last’ ft Xzavier Stone, into the bumpy instrumental of ‘Let's Go’, the album switches tone with ‘Simple Stuff’, followed by regular collaborator Le3 bLACK amplifying Loraine's vulnerability on the downcast drill of ‘Black Ting’, then ‘Insecure Behaviour And Fuckery’ is a techno glide which pairs Nova's confrontational plea for respect, delivered in monotone autotune, against deep Drexciyan chords. With Baths on vocals, the weightlessness of ‘On The Lake Outside’ soothes numb feelings, and Eden Samara explores the shadow world of anxious dreams on the airy R&B of ‘Running Like That’. Closing track ‘We're Building Something New’ with Manchester rapper Iceboy Violet brings the album together, confidently suggesting a new world is in reach. ‘Reflection’ is a brave step forward for a unique and creative 21st century musician

TRACK LISTING

A1. Built To Last (ft Xzavier Stone)
A2. Let's Go
A3. Simple Stuff
A4. Black Ting (ft Le3 BLack)
A5. Insecure Behaviour And Fuckery (ft Nova)
A6. Self Doubt (Leaving The Club Early)

B1. On The Lake Outside (ft Baths)
B2. Reflection B3. Change
B4. Running Like That (ft Eden Samara)
B5. We're Building Something New (ft Iceboy Violet)

Hyperdub are excited to present our first soundtrack release, Lawrence Lek's score for his debut feature film ‘AIDOL’, which premiered at Sadie Coles HQ in 2019 and has been shown at numerous virtual and physical festivals and exhibitions worldwide. Lawrence Lek is a simulation artist who uses computer-generated animation and video game engines to create films and virtual worlds that play with the language of science fiction, music videos and corporate world building. He has released soundtracks to five of his previous projects, most recently ‘Temple’ OST (Vinyl Factory, 2020).

‘AIDOL’ continues his on-going 'Sinofuturist' cinematic universe, which posits the creative theory that China's technological rise is an emergent form of Artificial Intelligence. ‘AIDOL’ is a CGI fantasy that tells the story of a fading superstar, Diva, who enlists an aspiring AI songwriter to mount a comeback performance at the 2065 eSports Olympic finale. Set in a realm of spectacular architecture, sentient drones and snow-deluged jungles, ‘AIDOL’ revolves around the long and evolving struggle between humanity and Artificial Intelligence; a shifting and seductive virtual reality, punctuated by Diva’s songs and the voice of Kode9 as the unforgiving label boss. The soundtrack is a delicate lattice - complex, opaque and entirely synthetic. Diva’s yearning vocals - created with a Vocaloid voice synthesiser, sung in English and Mandarin - cast classical melodies over billowing, intricate arrangements. The instrumental tracks, produced with composer Seth Scott, are elegiac and beautiful, hybridising the film score archetype, folding in patterns from game soundtracks, vaporwave, and ambient fourth world music.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Intro (My Single Isn't Finished Yet)
A2. Deep Blue Monday
A3. In The Game
A4. Chance Encounter (Jungle Theme)
A5. Call Of Beauty
A6. Welcome To SoMA
A7.Unreal A8.Superstar

B1. One Nation
B2.Beware Your Fans, Diva
B3. Call Of Beauty (eSports Reprise)
B4.Followers (Diva's Theme)
B5.Farsight's Greatest Star
B6. In My Prime (Bonus Track)
B7.Apocalypse (End Credits)

The Bug aka Kevin Martin, and producer/vocalist Dis Fig aka Felicia Chen, refer to their style on ‘In Blue’ as “Tunnel Sound”; a foggy, melancholic meltdown of narco-dancehall-soul and dread-drenched, electronic dub. The 2018 prototype rhythms for this album were a continuation of Martin’s ongoing quest for a futuristic dancehall mutation, but more sci-fi, aquatic and smokey than before. An obsessive search for the right sultry 2AM voice to ride his syncopated walls of sub, fuzzed out white noise and infinite echoes eventually led him to Dis Fig’s torched soul-jazz glow, and 20 months of subsequent lab exchanges have resulted in the deeply sensual pulsations and lyrical long shadows of ‘In Blue’ - an album that shares shades of King Midas Sound’s wrecked lovers rock, alongside the bass immersion that The Bug has become infamously known for. Just as Martin took a stylistic swerve on ‘In Blue’, so did Chen. Previously known for experimental noise onslaughts and emotional exorcisms, she opts here for threatening intimacy and hushed confessionals, concentrating on bittersweet vocals and seductive surprises that are all the more potent for their inferred narratives and delicate delivery. Mixed during lockdown, the sense of claustrofear, escapism and tension throughout is palpable. With the bewitching croon of Dis Fig directing the flow, carnality and violence merge under the turbulent, cinematic surface of an hypnotically addictive album.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Around Me
A2.Come
A3.Destroy Me
B1.Blood
B2.In 2 U
B3.Levitating

C1.Forever
C2.Blue To Black
C3.Take
D1.No Return
D2.You
D3.End In Blue

‘All The Time’, Jessy Lanza's first album since 2016's ‘Oh No’, is the most pure set of pop songs that she and creative partner Jeremy Greenspan have recorded, reflective and finessed over time and distance. Innovative juxtapositions sound natural, like rigid 808s rubbing against delicate chords in ‘Anyone Around’, subtle footwork flutter giving a nervous energy to ‘Face’, unusual underwater rushes underpinning ‘Baby Love’.

The songs also sound more “live” than ever before. Jessy’s voice is treated, re-pitched and edited on songs like ‘Ice Creamy’ and gestural sounds seem to respond to her lyrics in songs such as ‘Like Fire’, which reward the listener on repeated plays. More than previous albums, the lyrics on ‘All The Time’ became an important focus for Jessy too, channelling the negativity of anger and frustration arising from some significant changes in her personal situation into the text. These lyrics sometimes process raw feelings, which aren't obvious to begin with, but are soon felt, standing in stark contrast to the cushioned settings of the music. ‘All The Time’ has ended as a triumph and an abstracted diary of a sometimes difficult, but enduring friendship and creative relationship, and it’s their best work yet.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Jessy Lanza has made many waves in the music world, finding a perfect home in the home of off-piste electronic adventures, Hyperdub. This one sees Lanza in a more playful mood, encompassing aspects of synthpop, future beats and r&b. It's a beguiling and exciting listen, and a superb return for Lanza.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Anyone Around
A2. Lick In Heaven
A3. Face
A4. Badly
A5. Alexander
B1. Ice Creamy
B2. Like Fire
B3. Baby Love
B4. Over And Over
B5. All The Time

Chicago footwork legend and co-founder of the Teklife producers crew (alongside his musical collaborator DJ Rashad), DJ Spinn makes his long awaited return to Hyperdub with ‘Da Life’ EP, and we couldn’t be happier to have him back. Featuring four brand new offerings, ‘Da Life’ EP is energetic, fast paced and classic footwork. First up is the high energy ‘Knock A Patch Out’, a frantic and cascading key melody contained in crisp claps, with Spinn’s vocal flowing in half way through the track. Next up is ‘Make Her Hot’, which starts out in half time blossoming into a full blown footwork slow jam. ‘Sky Way’, featuring Teklife member DJ Manny, has a moody G Funk melody that starts slowly in half time, with rolling snares and organic kicks. Closing track ‘U Ain’t Really Bout Dat Life’ is an ode to Teklife. Icey synths rise and shimmer with an auto tuned vocal from Spinn spelling out ''T-E-K-L-I-F-E”. Alongside Rashad, Spinn united the footwork genre's producers and took it global. 'Da Life' represents his re-entry back into the scene, four years after 2015's 'Off That Loud' EP, and he’s coming back as strong as ever. 

TRACK LISTING

A1. Knock A Patch Out
A2. Knock A Patch Out (Clean)
B1. Sky Way Ft DJ Manny
B2. Make Her Hot
B3. U Ain’t Really Bout Dat Life

Raised in the multicultural and mind-broadening London borough of Enfield, Loraine James grew up hearing everything from steel pan music to Metallica, from jazz and electronica to drill and grime, and the results of this exposure can be heard on ‘For You And I’. In part the album explores the complexities of being in a queer relationship in London - “I’m in love and wanted to share that in some way … to make songs that reflect layers of my relationship.” – and as a whole ‘For You and I’ is rhythmically free flowing and sprawling, with melodies that evolve into rippling keys, feeling like a live jam session with a jazz mentality, contrasting the delicate and abrasive. Opener ‘Glitch Bitch’ is a warm ear-worm, brandishing swirling textures with undulating keys and compressed percussion, with an introspective theme revisited soon after on third track ‘So Scared’, whose glitched percussion and syncopated dub bassline build to a frantic meltdown melody.

On ‘London Ting // Dark As Fuck’, inspired by Dizzee Rascals's ‘Boy In Da Corner', James explores the darker side of her production with her frequent collaborator Le3 BLACK laying verses over the skeletal track. ‘Hand Drops’ is an instrumental, about public displays of affection in a queer relationship. ‘Sensual’ reflects on intimacy with vocals by UK singer Theo, whose lyrics capture love and gentleness over a soft, minimal production of ethereal keys and scattered glitches. The albums’ title track is also the most colourful, it’s ecstatic and effusive chaos driven by fervent synths expressing elation and the joyful side of her relationship, while ‘My Future’ is a more reflective moment, where warping synths wash in and out with compressed kicks, as the artist considers the dangers that may come with her relationship : “I wanna tie the knot / But the rope is dangerous”. ‘For You And I’ is a deeply intimate and personal offering, expressing happiness, anxiety, joy, sensuality and fear through a vivid sound palette and an experimental sense of rhythm.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Glitch Bitch
A2. London Ting // Dark As Fuck
A3. So Scared
A4. Hand Drops
A5. Sensual
B1. For You And I
B2. My Future
B3. Scraping My Feet
B4. Sick 9
B5. Vowel // Consonant 

Angel-Ho is known as one of the founders of Non Worldwide, alongside Chino Amobi and Nkisi. Highly regarded as a DJ and electronic music producer, on ‘Death Becomes Her‘ she shifts things up to another level. Pulling on inspiration from her flamboyant favourites from Lady Gaga, Missy Elliot, and Bjork through to Kanye West, this ambitious, artful and sometimes radical album of neo-pop pushes the pop framework even further, often teetering on the brink of vertiginous chaos and dissonance, whilst slowly revealing its depth and grandeur once you settle into its sound world. Alongside a cast of collaborators that include French producer Nunu, South African producer Baby Caramel, Asmara Maroof from Nguzunguzu, Bon and Gaika, Angel re-orientates the usual trans-atlantic pop sound to encompass a brace of experimental, diasporic producers to create beats that alternate between angular, propulsive, murky, loose, abrasive and breezy.

On top of these often advanced rhythms, she also raps and sings for the first time with lyrics about love, sex, glamour and struggle, universal fantasies, treated with an ambiguity that restructures the narrative within a trans-identity. Her choice of guest MCs also reflects this energetic queering with K-$ and Qweezy from Cape Town, plus underground Asian American rapper K-Rizz laying down assertive bars. On ‘Death Becomes Her’, Angel-Ho carves out a new space with her unique take on contemporary pop. Overflowing with charisma, sometimes reminiscent of Grace Jones, this album is fiercely sassy and celebratory. It feels like the start of something very exciting.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Business
A2. Drama
A3. Like A Girl Ft. K Rizz
A4. Jacomina
A5. Muse To You
A6. Good Friday Daddy Ft. Queezy

B1. Cupido
B2. Live
B3. Desity
B4. Pose
B5. Bussy
B6. Baby Tee Ft. K-$
B7. Like That
B8. Parachute

A generation younger than the founders of the Teklife crew, DJ Rashad and DJ Spinn, DJ Taye was originally a rapper and beat maker before hooking up with the collective and jumping into the world of footwork production and DJing. However, it was Rashad’s untimely passing in 2014 that was the unlikely catalyst for developing the sounds and ideas for this album. He says, "When Rashad passed away I felt inspired to continue evolving the music that I loved so much coming up in this world. So, I had to do something…make something brand new." 100% committed to pushing further the potential of the footwork template, Still Trippin’ is ambitious in its range and scope.

Taking two years to formulate, the record broadens the possibilities of the sound, forcing it to adapt to songwriting, and also revives Taye’s talent for MCing and producing beats to which he can rap and sing. Furthermore Taye definitely ups the ante with his complex and precise drum programming, never losing sight of footwork’s ability to confound. The album features a range of guests that span contemporary music; the eccentric, instructive rapping of Chuck Inglish of Detroit duo the Cool Kids is featured on ‘Get It Jukin’, Odile Myrtil, a young vocalist from Montreal, lends her smokey soul to ‘Same Sound’, Fabi Reyna, the editor of the celebrated women’s guitar magazine She Shreds, sings and plays bass and rhythm guitar on ‘I Don’t Know’ and Jersey club queen UNIIQU3 offers production and rapping on ‘Gimme Some Mo’.Also, Teklife members DJ PayPal and DJ Manny assist on production, and DJ Lucky is a guest MC on ‘Smokeout’. Taye is ambitious in his hopes for the album; "I took this as an opportunity to not have boundaries with footwork. Different approaches to our ‘underground’ sound to make it broader. It’s only underground until it crosses that visible threshold.” This album brings all of this to the forefront. 

TRACK LISTING

A1. 2094
A2. Trippin’
A3. Need It (ft DJ Manny)
A4. Smokeout (ft DJ Lucky)
A5. Same Sound (ft Odile Myrtil)

B1. 9090
B2. Anotha4 (ft DJ Manny)
B3. Bonfire (ft DJ Paypal)
B4. The Matrixx (ft DJ Manny)

C1. Get It Jukin’ (ft Chuck Inglish)
C2. Pop Drop (ft DJ Paypal)
C3. Gimme Some Mo (ft UNIIQU3)

D1. Truu (ft DJ Paypal)
D2. Closer
D3. I’m Trippin’
D4. I Don’t Know (ft Fabi Reyna)

"The Underdogg" is DJ Tre's debut EP for Hyperdub. He contributed two brilliant tracks to the DJ Rashad tribute set "Next Life", but compared to other long term members of the Teklife footwork crew, he hasn’t released much. Tre has been about since the early days, born and raised on the south side of Chicago. Encouraged by Rashad and his partner DJ Spinn, he has been making tracks since 1999, over a decade before footwork's ascent to global popularity. On this EP his sound, for the most part, is rooted in the speedy 4/4 of juke. It features a sparse and minimalist take on footwork but he's got a knack of adding in tight little switches and details that keep the tracks moving as essential dancefloor weapons. The EP starts with "It’s House Hybrid", which has its musical roots in Chip E's "It's House", one of the very earliest house tracks. It’s a tried and tested dancefloor devastator on dubplate, built on a crackling and hiccuping juke 4/4 which grows in intensity, until a ferocious amen break cracks it open and joins in the onslaught. "A Hammond Jam" matches a moody organ with typical sub rumbles and ghetto-tek drum programming. "Get Dat Ass Up!" bounces against a twitching melody that'salmost purist Detroit techno in its executed, save for the stuttered footwork rhythm that underpins it all. "Tha Rhodez Jam!" micro-edits a delicate Rhodes sample into flickering shapes against switching 8 bar patterns of drums that go from rolling to soca-like pulses with whistles. Essential tools for DJs on the hyperplane.

Jessy Lanza's second album 'Oh No' is addressed to her own constant nervousness. The pressure of music making, which used to calm her nerves, has led to a whole new world of contingencies that stoke the anxiety mill. The exclamation 'Oh No', for Jessy, marks yet another incident of randomness interrupting her tranquillity. All of which seems at odds with the confidence and spontaneity of this second album.

Made in her hometown of Hamilton, Ontario, with production partner Jeremy Greenspan from Junior Boys, the plaintive, reverb drizzled mood of the first album has all but given away to a more direct, self-assured and joyful set. As with many artists whose hometown lie off the usual network of cultural hotspots, 'Oh No' is driven positively by the idea of making music that isn't inspired by where she lives. Instead, the album resonates more with the philosophy of experimental pop of Japanese 80s electro outfit Yellow Magic Orchestra and Jessy's breathless, pitched vocals are reminiscent of YMO collaborator Miharu Koshi. Playfully laced with cascading arpeggios, crispy drum machines and breezy songs, 'Oh No' has an infectious energy that has been brewing in her live shows since her first album. As Jessy says ‘I want to make people feel good and I want to make myself feel good’.

The album oscillates between the languid, coiled, arpeggiated slow jams of ‘New Ogi’, 'Going Somewhere', 'Begins', 'Could Be U', 'I Talk BB' and the low slung 808 groove of 'Vivica', where Jessy’s vocal gymnastics run wild over minimal drums and synths, and the catchy upbeat boogie of ‘VV Violence’, ‘Never Enough’, 'Oh No' and the high point of 'It Means I Love You’ which has a sparse addictive bounce with a pitched up vocal refrain and a nod to Shangaan electro. The trials of dealing with nervousness are also encrypted into the artwork, such as the plants that recur in the sleeve and videos. As Jessy remarked, "I became obsessed with surrounding myself with tropical plants. I've been convinced that the air quality in our house is slowly killing us. It might sound crazy but the plants have made a huge difference." Anxiety and botanical remedies or not, 'Oh No' is a bold second album from Jessy and a marked step forward for her sound.

TRACK LISTING

A1. New Ogi
A2. VV Violence
A3. Never Enough
A4. I Talk BB
A5. Going Somewhere
B1. It Means I Love You
B2. Vivica
B3. Oh No
B4. Begins
B5. Could Be U

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2014 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

First ever vinyl pressing of Kode9 & The Spaceape’s 2006 debut album, including previously unreleased extra track ‘Stalker (alt edit)’.

Limited edition of 1000 copies exclusively for Record Store Day, pressed on translucent yellow vinyl, in gatefold sleeve.

TRACK LISTING

Side One
1. Glass
2. Victims
3. Backward
4. Nine

Side Two
1. Curious (Ft Miss Haptic)
2. Portal
3. Addiction
4. Sine

Side Three
5. Correction
6. Kingstown
7. Nine Samurai
8. Bodies

Side Four
9. Lime
10. Quantum
11. Stalker (Alt Edit)

Hot on the heels of his collaboration with Four Tet and Thom Yorke, Burial drops this solo 12" - his first in four years! Title track "Street Halo" sounds like 1990s speed garage (the bass-heavy, 4/4 end of UKG), but filtered through Burial's unique sound vision. Intricate, crackly (fear not, it's a deliberate atmospheric rather than any kind of pressing fault) and dream like, the track's rhythm moves along at a fair pace, while the melody and frail vocal seem to drift along on the ether. A beauty. "NYC" is even more fragile, with a sepia-tinted 2-step rhythm underpinning more retro crackle and a sped-up vocal - it's like Autotuned R&B for the 22nd Century. Lastly we have "Stolen Dog", possibly the most melodic of all three tracks, utilising a rolling broken house to tie down a subtle vocal and simple keyboard refrain.

The fourth and final EP taken from Terror Danjah’s "Undeniable" CD opens with the amazing "Leave Me Alone" featuring Terror’s old vocal spar Bruza. This time it’s different though - instead of his usual cockney mateyness, Bruza’s reflecting on his bad mood. "All I Wanna Do" is the album’s densest track, featuring East End singer / songwriter Lauren Mason, who complements Terror’s moody music with a forlorn and angry vocal about a break-up, Terror editing her lines into strange rhythmic shapes which rub against the subtle trap-doors and fills of his accompaniment. "Time To Let Go" is light and breezy in comparison. With light Rhodes keys and a vocal from Terror himself , this is a house track in disguise, as the constant shifting patterns of the drums work against the flow of the melodic elements to produce something that is simultaneously recognisable as a both genre track and a Terror Danjah trademark tune. Number Four in a series of four limited-edition EPs bringing "Undeniable" to life on vinyl. Limited pressing on phat wax.

The third EP taken from Terror Danjah’s "Undeniable" CD kicks off with one of the big surprises of the album, the inimitable genre-traversing "SOS", with a simple melodic riff played out over drum patterns that shift up in down in rhythm and tempo, grinding to a halt in the middle of the track before starting up again. "Sonar (Selassi Mix)" is a beatless mix of Terror’s classic grime riddim ‘Sonar’, where the originals rhythmic fx and melody pulse in and out of the mix creating strange smeared textures as sounds rub against each other. The album’s title track "Undeniable" features D Double E of Newham Generals, doing something you’d not expect of him – being romantic over Terror’s warm, colourful chords and melodies. Number Three in a series of four limited-edition EPs bringing "Undeniable" to life on vinyl. Limited pressing on phat wax.

London's Burial issues this belated overview of his career to date on Hyperdub, including the definitive "Spaceape" and other formative dubstep and grime highlights. It encompasses the myriad of styles which have followed and continue to manifest themselves after UK garages's implosion. Universally acclaimed as one of the best, most ground-breaking releases of 2006.

TRACK LISTING

Untitled 0:36
Distant Lights 5:26
Spaceape 4:02
Wounder 4:52
Night Bus 2:20
Southern Comfort 5:02
U Hurt Me 5:23
Gutted 4:43
Forgive 3:07
Broken Home 5:05
Prayer 3:46
Pirates 6:10
Untitled 0:55