Review: Brandon Coleman clearly revels in the background. Being a talented songwriter and arranger, along with killing it on the keyboard and organ, he has been at the back-end of groups like The Next Step and The Western Transient, pushing the boundaries of funk and broken beat to their very limits. He's back with his second solo LP this time, coming through on Flying Lotus' mighty Brainfeeder, and everything about this release feels utterly on-point - yessah! Taking a couple of notes and steers from the Daft Punk dynasty, along with the USA's lust for funk, Coleman's vocoder voice runs like silk across many of these playful and innovative boogie tunes, hitting us with some Cali vibes - and sunrays - from the moment "live For Today" melts into the waves of "All Around The World" and, eventually, into the longing, utterly seductive flow of "Sexy" and "Thereas No Turning Back". What is most impressive is Coleman's single-minded vision, coming through with an album that has one single sound and vision running through it. Excellent stuff.
The Victory Of The Echo Over The Voice - (2:15) 115 BPM
Sevastopol - (2:11) 112 BPM
Tsars And Hussars (feat Amir Yaghmai) - (5:00) 69 BPM
Battery Smoke - (2:16) 56 BPM
Belonging (feat Amir Yaghmai) - (3:33) 68 BPM
Pre-munitions - (2:24) 86 BPM
Shot And Shell - (1:52) 80 BPM
Country Of Conquest - (2:09) 77 BPM
Review: Alfred Weisburg-Roberts has always been impressively productive. Even so, few producers would be driven or creative enough to release 12 albums in as many years. The Light Brigade is his 13th, and offers a distinctly dreamy, sparse and evocative blend of drifting textures, eyes-wide-shut vocals, folksy acoustic guitars and complimentary electronics. According to Weisburg-Roberts, the album was inspired by the grim and bloody Crimean War, which certainly explains the album's melancholic tone. Certainly, it offers food for thought, with bittersweet, layered instrumentals - mostly of a beatless variety - flanking a trickle of thought-provoking, reverb-laden songs. Crucially, it's a stunning set that offers an immersive, heart-aching vision of the horrors of war.
Review: If you are looking for something very different, oozing class and musical prowess, then look no further than the latest helping from Brainfeeder, giving Daedelus the platform from which to perform an array of stunning original soundscapes. We have decided not to speak of individual recordings for this one, and rather than piece as a whole, as we are swept through the enormous breadth of electronic sound, from soaring, high end synthesizer harmonies to more digital, alarm-like tones ushering forward with a real sense of eeriness. This is a remarkable body of work that we highly recommend running on long play
Review: The fledgling DJ Paypal joins the likes of Lapalux, Martyn and Mr Oizo on the mighty Brainfeeder, and he does so with his inimitable blend of footwork-driven electronica, and mind-bending pseudo house. This extended EP features nine solid dance bruisers, starting with the jazzy drum rolls of "Ahhhhhhh" that fuse neatly into the likes of "Awakening", a gorgeous piece of nu jazz complete with the sexiest trumpets we've heard in a while, and "Sold Out" itself, a delightfully bumpy ride along a rollercoaster of percussion and starry melodies. This is jazz for the next millennium.
Review: One of two concurrent single-track releases here from Austria's Oliver T Johnson, better known as Brainfeeder and Ninja Tune favourite Dorian Concept (the other being 'Booth Thrust'). Only now being issued to the public in the wake of his successful 2018 sophomore long-player 'The Nature Of Imitation', 'Toothbrush' has been a staple of Concept's live shows (and the DJ sets of a select few friends including Modeselektor and Mark Pritchard) since around 2012, and opens with the sound of someone brushing their teeth, forming a shuffling rhythm that's then duplicated in arpeggiated, stop-start synths that subtly fluctuate in pitch as the track progresses.
Review: There's a pronounced split between the live incarnation of The Gaslamp Killer and his musical output, where most club kids have him down as some kind of chainsaw dubstep fanatic. However on record he morphs into a wondrous haze of 60s and 70s psych anchored to heavyweight funk. As his EPs promised, his debut album goes headfirst into a searing Molotov cocktail of psychedelic tendencies and exotic samples, from Indian strings to West coast guitars via groovy organs and hard-breaking drums. It's overloaded and messy in many places, red-lining and wild eyed, but anything less would be a disappointment right?
Review: Fresh from his Activia Benz release and collabs with Yoteghost Milk Empire and The Astral Plane, young UK experimenter Iglooghost makes his Brainfeeder debut. Sitting somewhere between classic breakcore, LA beats, juke and Binga-style 160-ism - and all wrapped up in a pixelated, technicolour 8-bit cartoon glow - it's unlike anything else on the sonic atlas right now. Highlights include the densely textured vocal loops on "Peach Rift", the cosmic trappisms of "Mamtchi/Usohachi" and the straight up 170 slappage of "Xiangjiao". Happy nu yr!
Review: Since his debut for Brainfeeder back in 2015, Iglooghost has opted for quality over quantity, which is an effective strategy to pursue given the competitive scene in which he operates. Having said that, a tune like "Bug Thief" comes out as the winner next to most pieces of music that you place it next to; a slight hint of AFX nuttiness encircles the air, but this is very much the producer's own creation from start to finish. High-tech, glitchy drum infusions burst to life amid frenetic medleys of aqueous sonics, and the result is something that sounds like it could be from either the US or the UK - the trick is simply to think of it as future music.
Review: Mitchel Van Dither has been synonymous with the Kindred Spirits label up until now, an imprint that we have just so much time and respect for. He has, however, been branching out as of late, and his adventures have landed him a spot on Flying Lotus' mighty Brainfeeder. Two EP's containing tunes from Fool have already been released on the label, but the album format expresses their depth much more clearly, and with more freedom. Objectively, Fool is Brainfeeder through and through, a little work of art to fit in perfectly with the rest of this ever-surprising and always on-point catalogue. Recommended.
Review: Dutch producer Mitchel van Dinther aka Jameszoo presents his new Flake EP; the follow-up to his debut album released via Flying Lotus' Brainfeeder. Brand new single "Rolrolrol" (feat. keyboardist Niels Broos) is some of the most organic 'future beat' you'll ever hear. Again it is an enjoyable blend of jazz and off kilter electronics. Van Dinther was rewarded for his adventurous attitude in the studio by Gilles Peterson who bestowed upon him the "John Peel Play More Jazz" Award at the Worldwide Awards 2017.
Review: Mitchel Van Dinther, AKA Den Bosch-based Dutch producer Jameszoo, teams up with the Netherlands' Grammy-winning jazz orchestra Metropole Orkest and conductor James Buckley for this long player on Flying Lotus's Brainfeeder label, and the results will please those who like their sounds on the leftfield/experimental side. Ambience morphs into easy listening on opener '(flakes)', '(lose)' has a cartoonish feel, '(soup)' brings the moody, smoky jazz club vibes, '(flu)' injects a little James Bond glamour, '(meat)' starts as a sparse modern jazz workout before building to a euphoric, almost gospel-ish climax, and on it rolls for four more out-there jams that flit back and forth between Frank Zappa and 1970s Radio 2 with ease!
Review: Brainfeed, the LA label run by Flying Lotus, does what it wants and right now and it wants to put out a mammoth 17-track, three-volume album of jazz music yet to be heard on earth. Featuring a 32-piece orchestra, a 20-person choir and ten other instrumentalists from South Central called The Next Step, The Epic by Kamasi Washington is a remarkable journey of the outer reaches of the jazz galaxy. A future classic has landed.
Review: Ninja Tune are chuffed to bits, having secured a kind of talent jackpot for this, their latest release. Daedelus is a celebrated Californian electronic muso Alfred Darlington who here teams up with jazzy heroes Kneebody (featuring his old high-school pal and saxophone virtuoso Ben Wendell). The resulting long player, Kneedelus, is remarkable fusion of their two worlds: the authentic and the artificial, in other words a 'multi-headed beast straddling rock, jazz, and electronic music'.
Review: Essex might seem an unlikely base for someone creating decidedly wonky, off-kilter electronic music, but then Lapalux doesn't conform to lazy stereoptypes. Having previously impressed with a suitably strange but surprisingly melodic EP of abstract grooves on Picture Music, young producer Stewart Howard now finds himself dropping a debut album on Brainfeeder. Those who enjoyed his previous work will love When You're Gone. It solidifies his growing reputation as a bolder, edgier version of James Blake, offering a mix of twisted, next-level future R&B ("Yellow '90s"), touching downbeat soundscapes ("102 Hours Of Introductions"), delay-laden electronica ("Construction Deconstruction") and bright-eyed, abstract wonkiness ("Gutter Glitter").
Review: Stuart Howard aka Lapalux is here once again for his second EP for our beloved Brainfeeder imprint...and my word, this guy is a machine! With him, we have the lovely vocals of Kerry Leatham, who immediately makes herself heard on the radio edit of "Without You", a decomposing bundle of semi-beats and dwindling pads whose purpose in life is solely to make your evening's that little bit more deep and sexy. There is also an original version for all your instrumental needs, but it's the alternate version of "Swallowing Smoke" which really does the business here - harsh-stepping hip-hop beats over that trademark Brainfeeder excursionism we all adore so much. The previously released "Guuurl" also finds some space on this majestic and soul-warming EP from a very exciting young producer.
Review: Making his second appearance on Brainfeeder, Essex-based Stuart Howard serves up another EP of pastoral romanticisms steeped in melody and organic textures. It's the kind of heartfelt, shoe-gazing electronica that comes on with less swagger than many of Howard's label mates, but is no less rich in detail and creativity. "Forgetting & Learning Again" has a strong scent of Mount Kimbie in the sweetly weird synth daubs and loping beats, but bolstered by a greater sense of drama in bombastic chorus drops and thoroughly British vocals from Kerry Leatham. There is tougher beat material to be found, as on the feisty throwdown "Strangling You With The Cord", but it's clear Howard's talents lie in a more gentle place.
Review: Lapalux and Brainfeeder have something of a relationship and each single release for the label has been better than the last, but we finally have the man's first full-length work and boy does he come correct! As per usual, it's pretty arduous to categorise Lapalux's music and we're presented with an incredibly diverse collection of rhythms and sonic concoctions, such as the twisted, half-stepping cacophony of "Kelly Brook", or the incessant beat-shuffle of "Flower" and the neo-hip-hop vibes of "Swallowing Smoke". Kerry Leatham features on the chimerical sub-tones of "Without You" while there's another special appearance by Astrid Williamson on "Dance", a certified UK-filtered vocal chant, brimming with futurism and enough soul to have you humming along to its hypnotising lullabies for hours on end. Lapalux going in for the kill...
