Acid Wave Podcast #39: Pearsall (Sonicrampage, Berlin)
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Mixed in Berlin, December 2018
100% Vinyl
(60:50, 139 MB, 320 kbps MP3)
Style: Acid Techno and Electro
Direct link to the mix:
http://sonicrampage.org/mixes/acidwave/Pearsall-AcidWavePodcast039.mp3
Tracklisting:
Tracklisting:
01. Posthuman – Nightride to New Reno (Balkan Vinyl)
02. Neville Watson – De-Basement (I Love Acid)
03. Photonz – Blood Is Life (Acid Avengers)
04. Boston 168 – J The Master (Attic Music)
05. Alien Rain – Alienated 2A (Alien Rain)
06. Dax J – Zion (Monnom Black)
07. Nite Fleit – Partly Sunny (Steel City Dance Discs)
08. Nonentity – Granite City Acid (Source Material)
09. No Moon – Acid IX (Mechatronica)
10. Locked Club – Electro Raw (Private Persons)
11. Andreas Gehm – Two Times More (I Love Acid)
12. Collin Strange – Private Thoughts (Long Island Electrical Systems)
13. Regal – Acid Is The Answer (Involve)
14. Dax J – Reign Of Terror (Electric Deluxe)
15. 88 Mindcraft – Deletion (Drill Hall)
16. 88 Mindcraft – Direct Sound (Drill Hall)
17. Regal – Still Raving (Involve)
18. SMD – SMD5 (A) (SMD)
This is a mix I recorded recently for the Acid Wave Podcast crew in Dortmund. The mix actually premiered back on January 1st, so I have been a bit slack in getting around to posting it here and making it available for download. Sorry about that!
So what is going on with this mix? Well, it’s a modern acid mix, starting with acid house / lighter acid techno before going in to acid electro and then finishing with some boshing full-power acid techno. All vinyl and all stuff from the last few years.
Here’s a little guide to the tracks I included in the mix:
Posthuman – Nightride to New Reno (Balkan Vinyl) The mix kicks off with the first track from Posthuman’s new album, Mutant Acid City – Posthuman are probably the most prominent London acid house revivalists, known as they are for the excellent I Love Acid label and parties, as well as their productions and appearances on other labels. This is a slow-burning spacy acid track, and I thought it would be the perfect intro tune.
Neville Watson – De-Basement (I Love Acid) The second track is from the most recent release on Posthuman’s I Love Acid label, and is by Neville Watson. I don’t know anything about the guy actually, I just know this is my favorite tune on the release, and it’s a perfect continuation from the opener – a minimal acid rumbler that is just that bit grittier, crucial to slowly turning up the intensity.
Photonz – Blood Is Life (Acid Avengers) Acid Avengers is a French label with some of the best artwork around – just check out their Bandcamp. This is a thumping acid track with a deep and eerie breakdown.
Boston 168 – J The Master (Attic Music) Boston 168 are an Italian acid techno duo making stuff that is pretty clearly influenced by old psychedelic and hard trance. Which is nice! Music is pretty cyclical, right, so it’s interesting that producers like Boston 168 are rediscovering the early trance sound, when trance was rhythmic, melodic and hypnotic, and not the over-the-top cheese it became by the late 1990’s. These guys seem to have become pretty big and are taking their live set everywhere at the moment. One apology: there is a slightly wonky mix into this track. I did fix it quickly, though. This is on the darker end of their sound. Heavy drums, acid lines, and dark vibes. Simple but effective.
Alien Rain – Alienated 2A (Alien Rain) Alien Rain is a long-running minimal acid project from Berlin-based Patrick Radomski (aka Milton Bradley). If you’ve heard any of my other modern acid mixes in recent years you will have heard some of his other tracks. They mostly follow a similar template – lots and lots of hypnotic repetition, but I think they work nicely as a bridging device.
Dax J – Zion (Monnom Black) Dax J is definitely the biggest name on this mix. He’s an English techno dj and producer who is based in Berlin and who has become a key figure in the revival of proper banging techno. Fuck loopy minimalism! His label Monnom Black has been consistently putting out bangers, and on the dj front he just kills it. This is another great track of his, wiring multiple acid lines over a slamming percussive base.
Nite Fleit – Partly Sunny (Steel City Dance Discs) Nite Fleit is an Australian dj/producer who is based in London (I think?). I think her release on Steel City Dance Discs was probably one of my all-around favorite releases last year, featuring as it does three kicking electro tracks and one gorgeous breaks track. I featured ‘Little Friend’ from the same EP on Get It 002 and am planning to use the breaks tune as the intro on a breakbeat-oriented Get It mix, maybe 4 or 5. This is a great track to transition into the electro section of the mix – jagged robotic beats and a steadily filthier acid riff. Massive tune.
Nonentity – Granite City Acid (Source Material) Here’s some seriously pumping acid electro from a new label from Aberdeen (hence the Granite City name). Back in the Rampage days I even played in Aberdeen once and then went back to an afterparty in a council flat where I tried (and failed!) to drink Buckfast on an empty stomach. Interesting times.
No Moon – Acid IX (Mechatronica) No Moon is an electro artist from Manchester and this was his first release on Mechatronica, which is a label that my friend Mejle runs with some friends. This is probably my favorite release on Mechatronica and I also used the title track Sirens on Get It 002. This is quite a spaced-out electro track, a little step down in intensity from the previous track, but that was deliberate, as I thought it would make sense to take the pressure off for a moment or two.
Locked Club – Electro Raw (Private Persons) Again, this is another release where I used a different track on Get It 002, and in this case this is from Locked Club, who are described in their promo material as ‘Russian electro punk’, which sounds good enough to me! This is another step up in intensity after the lull of the previous track, and a fitting end to the electro section.
Andreas Gehm – Two Times More (I Love Acid) OK, so back to techno. This is a straightforward acid banger from Andreas Gehm, the Cologne producer who sadly passed away several years ago. It’s well worth checking out his back catalogue, as he produced a lot of great dance tracks, covering everything from funky electro to jacking Chicago-style house to smooth Detroit-style techno and on to heads-down acid mayhem like this. A great starting point would be his posthumously released album on Solar One, The Worst of Gehm.
Collin Strange – Private Thoughts (Long Island Electrical Systems) Another release that I don’t know too much about – this is from New York’s Collin Strange and it’s an acid banger, no more no less. L.I.E.S. has become a pretty big label in the techno scene in recent years, with a very diverse output, and I have to be honest that I’m not huge on all of it. This release was great though – I also used the track Private Lives on last year’s Junior Techno Fruit Gang.
Regal – Acid Is The Answer (Involve) Regal is a Spanish producer from Madrid who is doing ravey acid techno, and this is one of his bigger tunes (in fact it just got repressed) – rolling basslines, stuttering vocal, and twisting acid – dude this hits me right in the metaphorical g-spot.
Dax J – Reign Of Terror (Electric Deluxe) Yeah, another Dax J tune. So? I was happy with the double-drop into this … go me!
88 Mindcraft – Deletion (Drill Hall)
88 Mindcraft – Direct Sound (Drill Hall)
I’ll talk about these two together, because … it’s easier. Anyways, the artist seems to be from somewhere in Northern England and he has done a whole bunch of these Extreme Acid releases, all of which involve heavy metal style artwork with dragons and stuff like that and hard distorted drums and really filthy acid. Absolute mayhem, but probably good only in small doses.
Regal – Still Raving (Involve) Regal’s most recent tune – I just threw this in because I like it. Actually I guess you could argue this mix was a little lazy in that I reused a number of the artists through the mix, but I guess it’s fine.
SMD – SMD5 (A) (SMD) The very last track is from the one and only DJ Slipmatt under his SMD (aka Slipmatt Dubs) alias – this one takes the famous acid riff from Josh Wink’s ‘Higher States of Consciousness’ and the melody from Underworld’s ‘Rez’ and layers it all over a thumping 4/4 kick. It’s always been one of my favorite acid riffs, so it’s nice to have it in a format like this, as the original version is a somewhat slow breaks track that doesn’t always work for me, given my long-term love for fast music.