Pearsall presents There & Back 006: Fun Under 130 BPM, 1996-2023
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Recorded in Berlin, August 2024
100% Vinyl
(109:10, 250 MB, 320 BPS MP3)
Direct link to the mix:
http://sonicrampage.org/mixes/thereandback/Pearsall-ThereAndBack006_June_FunUnder130BPM1996-2023.mp3
Tracklisting:
- Mall Grab – Liverpool Street in the Rain [Looking For Trouble]
- Intimacy – Grid Projector [Vector Works]
- DJ Longdick – Nightscape [E-Beamz]
- Phyzikal Flex – Policies [Doom Chakra / Parallax]
- Type-303 – Hey Listen! [I Love Acid]
- Elec Pt 1 – Summer Time In Coloniae [Happy Skull]
- Skee Mask – Trackheadz [Ilian Tape]
- Head High – What You Want [Power House]
- Martyn – Newspeak [Dolly Dubs]
- Maya Jane Coles – What They Say [Real Tone]
- Joy Orbison – Ellipsis [Hinge Finger]
- Boddika – Steam [Swamp 81]
- Blackdown – Halcyon Skies (Rollage Mix) [Keysound]
- Hugo Massien – Broke the Cycle [17 Steps]
- Special Request – Forbidden [Houndstooth]
- UNKLE – Celestial Annihilation [Mo Wax]
- CJ Bolland – Starship Universe [Internal]
- L/F/D/M – Beaks in Zen [Midnight Shift]
- Chrissy – Like A Fantasy [Chiwax]
- The Usual Suspects – Daydreemin’ [End Recordings]
- Plantastik – At Last [Kickin]
- Luca Lozano – Boss Moves [Running Back]
- DJ Slyngshot – Battlecat [Yappin]
- Luca Lozano & DJ Fett Burger – Electric Blue [Sex Tags UFO]
- Basement Jaxx – Slide Slide [Atlantic Jaxx]
- Jerome Hill – Harlesden Shuffle [Super Rhythm Trax]
- Jedi Knights – One for MAW [Universal Language]
- Mood II Swing – All Night Long [Groove On]
- The Wamdue Project – In The Back of Your Mind [Strictly Rhythm]
- Krimp – House of Pain [Strictly Rhythm]
I asked ChatGPT to write an intro to this mix:
House music lovers, get ready for a sonic journey across the decades! This new 30-track mix pulls together some of the best in house from 1996 through to the latest sounds of 2023, highlighting both classic anthems and modern gems. From the deep, rolling grooves of Mood II Swing to the gritty, atmospheric vibes of Skee Mask, I’ve carefully curated these tracks to showcase the evolution of house music over nearly three decades. Dive in, let the beats carry you, and discover the threads that connect the timeless with the cutting edge.
AI slop is so boring to read. No personality, no voice. I’ll skip that in future!
Anyways, this is a mix I did back in August and put online a few weeks back, but am only just writing about now.
Why?
Well, to be honest, I’ve had a hard time feeling motivated this year to do the social / promo / writing side of my mixes. The music part? Sure, that I can still do (even if I wish I could do more); in fact, even after this one I still have three more in the can, waiting to go online.
But the other stuff? I guess I’m just not feeling that part so much – honestly, social media like Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, etc, just feels like a grind these days. I even wanted to start posting the mixes to YouTube to get some more listens (since Soundcloud doesn’t seem to get as much traffic as before), but that also feels like a pain. Making the mixes and listening to them is still super fun, but I’m just kind of bored by social media.
Aren’t you as well?
I read somewhere that fewer people are posting to social media these days, which doesn’t really surprise me. It’s become kind of a hassle, right? Posting on message boards when I was 20 was super fun. Very decentralized, and a great way to meet people and make life-long friends. Now it’s all become very centralized (in comparison), and it’s kind of a slog, stuff doesn’t really reach people unless the algorithms pushes it in front of them. It’s a pain!
If you want people to hear stuff, you need to constantly be posting, constantly be thinking about the content side (separate from the actual music), and just making a lot of effort. Fuck that – I’m just a bedroom dj, not an influencer.
But the music … well, the music is still fun!
This mix is a case in point – it’s had barely 150 listens on Soundcloud since I stuck it up a few weeks ago (ouch!), but that doesn’t mean I don’t think this is a great mix.
Because it is … well, to me anyways! (I am my own favorite dj, after all)
As I mentioned in the last post, this year’s mix project has been all about going deep into my record collection and having some fun, pulling out stuff I don’t normally play, and making connections between different artists, eras and sounds. With this mix I wanted to keep things under 130 bpm, which is very slow by my historic standards, but something I’m getting increasingly interested in. Having recently turned 44 and now being in my mid-40’s officially, I guess this speed also now feels … not bad? I’m getting older, after all!
Anyways, I’ve never been a major league house head, at least compared to other styles, but you can’t be an electronic music vinyl enthusiast like me, who owns as many records as I do, and who has been collecting for as long as I have, without ending up with enough house records to at least do a few mixes.
It’s just not possible!
So with this mix I wanted to have some fun exploring house sounds under 130 bpm, but I also wanted to shoehorn some other stuff into it, hence the section in the middle where it temporarily segues off into electro and breaks.
Why not, right?
My approach to this mix was not super scientific or complicated; I just wanted to have some fun, and not get too hung up on genres or eras, like I sometimes do. That’s why this mix covers such an eclectic range of tracks, starting with some 2010’s lo-fi house (a craze of the last decade), and ending with classic 90’s US deep house. In between there is everything from euphoric acid house to Berlin jack trax to early 2010’s bass music to late 90’s London tech-house to Luca Lozano’s modern twist on classic house. There’s an obscure early Basement Jaxx b-side, spacey acid disco from Jerome Hill, Blackdown’s syncopated Detroit-meets-London grooves, orchestral electro from UNKLE, CJ Bolland’s breakbeat monster ‘Starship Universe’ played at the wrong speed, and a true deep house epic from the Jedi Knights. And much more.
Not too many house mixes have such a diversity of sounds, if I’m being honest!
Even if this mix hasn’t had too many listens, and likely won’t have many more in the future, I’m really proud of it, and I’m delighted to share it with you.
I hope you enjoy it.