MARY LATTIMORE — HORSES, GLOSSY ON THE HILL

⌾ LISTEN TO HORSES, GHOSTLY ON THE HILL BY MARY LATTIMORE ⌾

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What a piece of scene-setting, no, scene-conjuring music. Ostensibly and most lazily labelled "harp music", this new song from LA-based harpist Mary Lattimore takes the harp to dizzying new heights, escaping the confines of earthly planes to float and jostle among unnameable ethers in fury of string bending and hefty effects experimentation.

With its emotive title, 'Horses, Glossy on the Hill' stamps into being an equine freedom, acheiving this majesty with shining strings, a procession of tumbling percussive sounds like so many disembodied hooves. Wild flutters of the harp jump and play, buck and canter; even a slice of chiptune finds its way in there, glowing with retro warmth, an animal cosiness emanating from it.

Its final third is characterised by such heavenly sweeps of the harp, mingling with those same sounds but in reverse like otherworldly birds. It's a soundscape like no other, speckled and beglittered with pinprick minutiae on the highest registers of the harp, with dark rumbles of synth eliciting mystery behind the playfulness as the scene fades. The horses, galloping off, disappear from view.

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• 🔔 'Horses, Glossy on the Hill' is taken from the new Mary Lattimore album, Goodbye, Hotel Arkada. It's releasing 6th October via Ghostly; pre-order it on Bandcamp, if you like.

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JUHAN ONGBRIAN — SAIL ON

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‘Sail On’ is an apt title for jazz guitarist Juhan Ongbrian’s masterful piece of music. Not only does this song seem to travel effortlessly on gentle waves of sound, like a heavenly sailboat, but it seems to be a spiritual and sonic successor to ‘Albatross’ by Fleetwood Mac.

For sailors, to kill an albatross while at sea was considered a bad omen; so the equally oceanic ‘Sail On’, perhaps, is the sequel here — in the timeline that no albatrosses were harmed, at least.

While the bass guitar (Austin Smith) creates a gloopy groove of stepping notes, like the sturdy materials of a seagoing vessel, or the shape of waves; the slow, calculated drums (Adrian Michael) represent the rhythm of the sea itself, the gentle tick of water lapping against the hull. Ongbrian’s guitar — dropping in at 1:38 — is expansive, a veritable sky of sound, exuding endless possibilities and a moment of bliss all at once.

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• 🔔 You can stream or download Juhan Ongbrian's 'Sail On' from whichever service on this list is your absolute favourite.

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ELLIOT JAMES MULHERN — HOW'S IT GONNA STOP?

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Beginning with an acoustic version of itself, musicmaker Elliot James Mulhern's new track 'How's It Gonna Stop?' asks a simple, very timely question. It's the titular refrain, layered and bouncing in the crunch of its decayed disco drums.

"Looking back on it now I suppose I was actually wondering ‘how *is* it gonna stop?’" Mulhern tells yes/no via email. "This song was a constant dream; I remember during lockdown waking up with it in my head persistently."

Eventually, that persistent creation became a one-take voice memo: "The more I played, the song took on a life of its own, like a chiseled granite statue," he recalls. It was already there: an atmosphere waiting to be captured.

There's a soft nocturnal sound to 'How's It Gonna Stop?' — a sense of fatigue in the low glimmer of the chords, of street-lit tension in the high siphoning strings, of thudding feet on dark tarmac in its clipped bass groove. Mulhern's voice itself flutters among it all; downcast but bright, slow and measured, before skipping up the scale.

The song summons a day lived, a dream dreamt. Or the tired glow you feel walking home from work: happy, but too exhausted to celebrate. Sort of how we'll feel when 2020 is finally over.

"It’s certain none of us knew how bizarre and challenging this year would become," says Mulhern. But he notes a silver lining in the hefty clouds of this annus horribilis, citing how artists are (to some degree) conditioned to work in isolation.

"This was the most extreme version of that," he continues. "And if I’m truly honest, the intense amount of emotional weight on us all drove me to write from an entirely new, rawer vulnerable place."

The video for 'How's It Gonna Stop?' takes Mulhern from the reality of a London phonebox and its surrounding grit, soundtracked by the organic skitter of acoustic guitar, and flings him into a visually disorienting world of rapid cuts and offset angles. Watch it below.

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• 🔔 'How's It Gonna Stop?' is taken from Elliot James Mulhern's upcoming album Tiny Correspondence, Dangerous Ideas and Sensitive Affairs. It's due out 20th November on Mulhern's own Blossöm Records. You can pre-order it on Bandcamp.
• 🔔 The track was mastered by Frank Arkwright (Coldplay, Elton John, Oasis) at Abbey Road Studios, London. "[I'm] eternally grateful to have ['How's It Gonna Stop?] completed at Abbey Road, minutes from where I was born and raised, whose records had immeasurable impact on my life," Mulhern tells us.

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FRANKIE REYES — ALMA DE LA PALMA

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Gabriel Reyes-Whittaker — perhaps beter known for his label Gifted & Blessed and making house music as GB — has a string of musicmaking aliases. One of these is Frankie Reyes, the name behind the wonderful 'Alma De La Palma' — a fuzzed-out dappling of emotive notes 'n' chords for a sort of supercharged classical-minimalist lounge music.

With its soft and muted textures, the bold stretches of delay further heightening its languorous glimmering feel, the scattering of sweeping notes, 'Alma De La Palma' feels as though you're looking down and something through water. The rippling surface skews the scene; a hint of warped beachside heat, too hot to move, sparkles around the edges.

The notes themselves, a distant disoriented tumble of longing, pull classical music through the portal of time, leaving the wooden depth and angularity of the piano behind and exchanging it for the magic of circuitry. And in the minor chords and descending notes of Frankie Reyes piece, there is something reminiscent of Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 14 aka 'Moonlight Sonata'; a sense of being tethered to something vital that, once close at hand, has moved on and away.

Here we have a sort of contemporary vision of the Beethoven standard. It was called "a nocturnal scene, in which a mournful ghostly voice sounds from the distance" by the composer's student (and composer in his own right) Carl Czerny. While Frankie Reyes' piece may not be "mournful", there is a lamenting feel that shapes it as similar in tone.

Less highly regarded, but no less atmospheric, the Castle Theme from 1990 SNES game Super Mario World — complete with the soft somersaulting of synthesised keys — is something else that 'Alma De La Palma' is aesthetically akin to. The Frankie Reyes track bubbles with this same, now retro, subdued and synthetic sound, and twinned with its classical, if not romantic flair, this is a song that captivates not just with its intoxicated effects, but also with its heartfelt composition.

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• 🔔 'Alma De La Palma' is taken from Frankie Reyes' forthcoming album Originalitos, set for release via Stones Throw Records on 23rd October. You can pre-order the album and listen to 'Alma De La Palma' over and over again on Reyes' Bandcamp.

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SAKEHANDS — GOODBYE FOREVER

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The slow rhythm of the soft chords in 'Goodbye Forever' by LA producer-slash-collective sakehands — aka Aris Maggiani — rolls in like laves lapping the gentle incline of a beach. More musical, obviously, but just as textured. And there's a detachment to it, a distance, like seeing this scene through an antique diving helmet, or witnessing it from the POV of a fish in a tank. The space between sounds leaves room for the track to impact and linger.

With the melted vocals of regular collaborator Lo poured all over it, this electronic ebb and flow transforms into a crashing on the rocks, the crunch and splinter of a hull (a heart) as a vocodered "Goodbye..." fanfares to the song's finale, the wreck of a ship jostling in the sunset-fired wash of water.

Melodic keys spin a lighter mood on proceedings, giving this track the wisdom and beauty of hindsight as opposed to the pain, the insta-heartbreak of the very moment of farewell. As Wordsworth wrote: "Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility" — a message no less relevant now than it was when this track first appeared.

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• 🔔 Download and/or purchase 'Goodbye Forever' from whatever streaming service is your favourite on this list of available services.
• 🔔 There's also a fun lyric video for 'Goodbye Forever'. See here.

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🐣 YMIR — STAIR [初演 • PREMIERE]

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Space. The final frontier. Well, not in this instance — 'Stair' by Los Angeles-based producer Ymir just sounds as though it's in space. That's because in this dramatic piece of ambient music, he's rising above and looking at from afar what was (at the time) "a new urban environment" — a new resident in an alien city.

"I'd never been somewhere that never sleeps before," Ymir tells yes/no by email. Originally from North Dakota, moving to Los Angeles was an eye-opening experience; he reveals that its particular sense of "decay" was soemthing that interested him.

"I think that was sparked by the more run-down areas of the city, and how different that was from what I was used to in my (relatively) small town," he says.

Suitably, the track hums with unsteady resonance, touched with lo-fi scratches and imperfections — a sense of sonic wear-and-tear that makes it feel as though this track has been around for years, floating in the air. Most noticeable are the wheeling changes in pitch, dynamic and flighty, continuing well into the swampy drone that drenches the track's final minute.

Giant bassy notes twang out a dirge of vast Western proportions, emanating from the depths of the city for miles around, a sense of classic instrumentation yet muffled under the waves of cosmic drama; far-off pines bristle against grid systems, someone huddles beneath an overpass.

Part far more gritty alternative soundtrack to 'Space Junk Road' from Super Mario Galaxy, part out-of-body experience looking out over the countless street lights and shuffling people of LA's urban sprawl, 'Stair' is a balanced, considered view of something new. Space — and tender, detached feeling — tempered into sound.

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• 🔔 Listen to 'Stair' on Spotify, or check out more of Ymir's unreleased electronic work on his SoundCloud.

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🐣 JONIE — SQUUUEZE

⌾ LISTEN TO JONIE, SQUUUEZE ⌾

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The cut-up collage of sound that stutters through 'Squuueze' flows softly and stays knife-edge sharp — testament to how LA-based producer Jonie digs the "unique energy and musicality" of '90s West Coast funk and hip-hop.

"Producers like Dre and Dilla used sampling in a way that was really musical, playing it like an instrument and composing with it," Jonie tells y/n. "I got into making electronic music a few years ago, and in the beginning it felt very stale and cookie-cutter, so I wanted to see if I could loosen the tie and emulate that musicality in my own may."

Accordingly, 'Squuueze' verges on virtuosic — and at times reminiscent of the 'Battle Against A Weird Opponent' theme from '90s SNES classic Earthbound. Bustling in the beginning, with varying textures, tones and colours jostling for space (people, cars, city sights), the track plays out the sun-drenched day and fades towards pastel evening in its second half; that West Coast lilt comes into play, a drawling high-pitched synth the herald of heat-warped tarmac and palms, the landscape of an idealised summer.

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• 🔔 Like what you hear? Check out more from Jonie over on SoundCloud.

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RHYNE — BIG MAC

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'Big Mac' is a frenzy of colour and synth, hollow sounds plasma blasting into a bristling thicket of beats, unrelenting in their forward propulsion. Sounding maybe a little like the soundtrack to Einstein's theoretical riding on a beam of a light, the track is a hyperactive tumble into a world of stuttering vocal samples and bone-rattling percussion.

"I wrote it in Joshua Tree desert," says Los Angeles producer RHYNE over email. "I find tracks written away in remote locations tend to sound different to those written in your home studio."

As such, the track marries broad, cosmic brushstrokes of synth — almost otherworldly in aesthetics and 3D, reach-and-out-and-grab-it texture — with hard beats, like a dream spilling out of a brain and onto a packed city dancefloor. In short, leftfield creativity and pure, unadulterated energy combine for an explosion of sound.

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• 🔔 'Big Mac' is taken from RHYNE's PAINT EP, which you can stream or download on Bandcamp at your leisure.

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🐣 JON HASSELL — PASTORALE VASSANT

This collage of sound comes from musicmaking veteran Jon Hassell, a collection of almost random knockings and thudding perucussion, striking bright piano feeling chords and twinklings, insectoid and creeping and with satisfactory edits to almost be venturing into the zippy world of breakcore. Tumbling soft chimes and bassy bell synths roly-poly throughout, helping with that sense of speed and motion. Background noise comes and goes, fizzing and whooshing as new and sharper chimes set in, this time real, organic, and which (sort of) give the track its title: 'Pastorale Vassant' (meaning 'Hillside Pastoral' in Catalan)—How though?

"I was staying in Deya, on the island of Mallorca," explains Hassell in the track's description on SoundCloud, "where flocks of goats roamed in the hills at night, each one with a slightly different neck bell. One balmy Summer midnight I stayed awake to record this floating, constantly-changing "gamelan" that enters in the distant background halfway into the piece."

You can hear in the track that nocturnal sound, the feel of mild still-awake night terrors, the what's-out-there wonder of the dark, and then the homely but lonely sound of these goats' bells, by themselves yet together, no other human around. All the other flighty noises of the night, the harsh abrasions of the ambient sound of the air like the esoteric recordings of a cryptozoologist, but above all the constant flutter of a mind churning and churning... And then: that blissful chord at the end, disparate to everything else that has come before, chimes into earshot rich and radiant, a dream of digital dimensions as the organic gives way to the synthetic, and sounding beautifully similar to the PS2 startup sound by Takafumi Fujisawa—that same full emptiness, empty fullness.

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• 🔔 'Pastorale Vassant' is the second track to be taken from Jon Hassell's upcoming album Listening To Pictures (Pentimento Volume One), following the urgent, relentless glitter of 'Dreaming'. You may pre-order it on Bandcamp ahead of its 8th June release on Ndeya Records, Hassell's own newly launched label.

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🐣 PETTICOAT — POMPOUS

You know in Super Smash Bros. how Kirby's Down Special Move turns him into some heavy object, like a spiked ball, 100-ton weight, a stone, a Thwomp, or a block of trash? Well this track is sort of like that. (If we assume that Kirby in his regular form is soft, then it works). 'Pompous' by the LA-based newcomer Petticoat is squishy, taffy-esque, pastel-coloured and popping with pizzazz, but then there is this constant, stony pugilism in the beat and the rolling modulated synth blasts that gives it a hard but sugary coating.

Kicks thump with a balance between gloopy and thudding, cementing the rhythm of the track and sending it up like karst landforms for a dramatic soundscape that juts out and jostles with jungle greenery; dreamy gleaming chimes chase each other in spears of glistening metallic dust—another similarity to the sparkly world of Kirby. And now piano chords clonk and clank polyrhythmic in the gorgeous goo of 'Pompous', pitched vocals squall heavenly in triumph at the terraforming foundation of it all. Durable, colourful, serious, soft, fantastical: get lost for a moment in the lovely world that Petticoat's created with his music.

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• 🔔 This is literally Petticoat's first original track so keep your ears peeled to his SoundCloud and follow him and stuff if you want to hear more.

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🐣 GEO — MÁGICA FEAT. CARO PIEROTTO

Last time we heard from GEO it was a glittering trail of intricate percussion and chimes in the form of lovely sound-sonnet ‘For You’. This time around the LA-based musicmaker gives us an insight into what makes him tick musically with a slice of sound that celebrates the rhythms of latin music.

“I sat down and wrote this one in an attempt to pay tribute to my love for the way latin makes me feel,” he tells us via email. And what a homage it is. Rather than pursuing one genre or another, and attempting to make something that is bossa nova, or samba, or whatever, ‘Mágica’ really does feel like a celebration: a rhythm that winds and sashays, more of that texturising percussion we’re used to that gives it some lush depth, and breezy chords that conjure cool scapes by the sea, instantly capitvating satin Ipenema vocals.

“To help pay homage to my roots,” GEO explains, “ Caro Pierotto graced this song with a beautiful Portuguese verse about finding magic in a new love.” Graced is definitely the right word, with this vocal and its pitch-shifted iterations adding beauty to the track.

This is not a typical bossa nova track, or a song that is typically anything. It’s a creation inspired by latin music, and as such it has taken interesting tangents from elsewhere, encompassing flavours like future funk – with that thudding groove and upbeat atmosphere – and even the somewhat-disco feel reminiscent of Japanese city pop. The lead synth-brass melody that refrained throughout reminded me of the 2 player version of the Casino Night level on Sonic 2. ‘Mágica’ is a versatile track that defies expectations in a modern cosmopolitan retelling of traditional sounds.

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• 🔔 Have a look-see at 'Mágica' on HypeM.

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🐣 PASTEL — CLOSE

The space afforded by this track, the expansiveness of it, how it manages to put you in this swirling realm of love, yet also retain this very intimate feeling, as if your ears are being privately whispered into, is testament to pastel's efforts as a musicmaker. And not only this, but this atmosphere is summoned with great simplicity, a seeming effortless swathe of sound that utilises sparse elements to maximum effect: mainly a simple beat, a bit of soft synth, and voice. The difference between the sense of space and intimacy is best illustrated in this song by the big rush of sound that is the chorus, the only moment where there is any sort of loudness, representing a swell of feeling. Still there is an underlying mist of loneliness here, a distant wind that is like a sadness that cannot be shaken.

But, that said, 'close' is a lovesong, that's for sure (it's dedicated to Valentine's Day, so it'd better be). And as such it's full of lovely moments, small parts like the sudden downturned chord change at 1:15, the constant fluttering heartbeat of the kicks as they propel the song nervously forward, the sparing use of a little soft melody that gently bloops on-and-off in this gorgeous minimalist morsel. Last time we heard from pastel it was a different story: the sandstorm ambient abrasions of 'stammer' from absent, just dust summoned an almost inexpressible sadness and isolation. His vocals were lost in the noise.

Here, however, the vocals are clear, liquid, bravely at the forefront and completely a capella sometimes: long tracts of the vocal begin the unexpected hook, "Do you think about my body? ..." Warm harmonies abound. It's beautifully honest, heart-on-sleeve songwriting sung with caramel smoothness, touching moments treated with gorgeous simplicity – "you held me a little longer than the last time we met" – inspire real images of real romance, and stealing your own heart in the process.

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• 🔔 This Valentine's Day special arrives courtesy of Very Jazzed (part of Frenchkiss Label Group)

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🐣 LEJKEYS — CHEERS FEAT. ARI AFSAR

Julian-Quan Le aka LeJKeys creates this voyage of calm in 'Cheers'—a sort of kinetic stillness, a lovely slow sway of sound, like watching fish dart and float around in their submarine homes in shallows where seaweed streams in the current and anemones curl and stretch in slow motion, all of it shone upon by glassy dappled sun through the wobbling waves. It's a simple perfect scene summoned by the track's own gorgeous simplicity.

The slowness and friendly calm that LA-based pianist and producer LeJKeys conjured with soft synth boops and unassuming sparse beat, a lazy cheerful whistle that folds into it all, moments of intensity with the brimming happiness of fizzing synth chords, not to mention the clear upbeat vocals of Ari Afsar – sometimes gently layered and pitch-shifted, beautifully drawn-out, but always lilting sweetly – is a testament to positivity and wonder.

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• 🔔 'Cheers' featuring singer and actor Ari Asfar is taken from LeJKeys' album Between Worlds. Listen to or purchase it on Bandcamp.

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🐣 OH MY MUU — WORTHY

There is something beautifully sad about this song—even before you learn of its origins, which makes it sadder still, there is an air of farewellness to it, the slumping gentle feeling of the plucked synth that weaves through, the poignant space left between each resonation: the emotion behind it rather than the melody itself, which itself is wistful in its slow cheeriness, like bright blurry eyed melancholy. And the title: 'Worthy'. It hits the heart, combining with the music – the frustrated whispering glitch of percussion, the close intimate feeling of the beat, the warmth and welling-up of the thicker synth and bass, the watery outdoors samples symbolic of life and living – to summon this small heroic hope in the downtrodden swirl of depression.

But in 'Worthy' its creator, LA-based producer James Im aka oh my muu, is not only building this emotive and inspirational soundscape in and of itself; rather it has been created as a tribute to Kim Jong-hyun, the K-pop star who committed suicide on 18th December 2017. As such the song takes on a whole different persona, and becomes bigger than it is: especially when it is imbued as it is with Jonghyun's spirit—a sample from the singer's 2015 song 'I'm Sorry' crackles throughout, broken and decayed, as if heard from an unknown elsewhere, uncovered by you personally amidst digital debris; a truly touching, intense element of the track that feels instantly timeless; a sweet swansong.

After more soft, playful synth, the track ends on a crescendo of fluttering grainy synth chords atop columns of bass, like tears and pain mingling with determination; or, having felt devoured by despair, it's the shock of having someone tell you, "it's ok, you are worthy." Catharsis and letting go.

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• 🔔 More excellent production from oh my muu over on his SoundCloud.

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🐣 WILD & FREE — FERNS AND STUFF

The groove piledrives through this track, the glossy dancefloor sparkles its glitter and the lights cut through the dark and dust. But mainly let's address that groove: bass guitar seems to somersault and cartwheel, it's an acrobatic full-bodied bass, tinged at the edges with metallic pugilism, something thudding about the way it curls like a snake covered in scaly armour around the bumping beat, the kick and abrasive handclap. Groove lies at the heart of this one, powers it, propels it forward.

LA duo Wild & Free, aside from these disco-summoning rhythmic patterns, also inject some faraway sense of darkness, of faded neo-noir, into 'Ferns and Stuff'. Stuttering synth arpeggios blip and boop twinkling in the air, and gradually there are these high pitched string sounds fluttering around this one particular note and effusing a sort of ambient tension with that soft persistence it has; and with wide sweeping chords that wobble with wonky progressions there is the guitar, half-surf half-late night jazz, distorted and starkly angled against its foundations. Vocals seem to speak from all sides, from beyond the vanishing point, a thin ghostly croon adding human intrigue to the dance steps painted boldly all over this one.

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• 🔔 'Ferns and Stuff' arrives courtesy of Lisbon-based label Discotexas, and is taken from Wild & Free's album Shapes on Shapes, which is out now also on Discotexas. You may purchase it via this hyperlink.

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🐣 CITY FATHER — COQUETTE

A tumbling drumkit and a set of disembodied hands engaged in a rapture of rhythm, the hammering and clatter-tshh of the virtousic fills and thuds that trill and flood the air with hard bristling organic sound, the ultimate in percussive propellant, summoning the speed of rolling down inclines and speeding around corners late at night with dim street lights thumping your peripheral vision. The beat in 'Coquette' by LA producer City Father is full of life, both by extension of its sense of movement and also by its intimate, sound-coming-from-the-room-next-door aesthetic, ostensibly real sounds that breathe and scrape with robust physicality.

It begins thin, just this thunder-and-lightning of percussion bumping the track along on a backdrop of nocturnal void, as well as this sampled panting whispering and sheafing through the track like turning the page of a dusty book, the regular breathing of a late-night rendez-vous, but harshly cutting through the sound, a particular detail of memory on loop. The track morphs via scintillating synth details, fibrous and plasma-like, into something with more body, sludgy synth bass rising like a tide towards the end – something like a vocal hooting and crooning wordlessly colourful in the monochrome of it all – heating the track up into a scathing crescendo before it cuts off and fades into forlorn quiet, the empty feeling of despondence.

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• 🔔 This track arrives courtesy of LA-based label and artist collective Mateo Sound. You can download it for free via The Artist Union.

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🐣 COOL TRIPS — LANDMARK

The melting atmosphere, the horizon spilling onto the earth and the grand oil colour splashes, the waves of thick stodgy paint, swirling and whirling together and running over the land like a flood in slow motion. That's 'Landmark' setting the scene for you, the low-slung sludgy psychedelia of it crafted by Portland-based musicmaker Cool Trips—not the typical sun-glittering stuff you might be used to, but this inhabits a different time of day, a different state of mind, the chorus crooning in with grounded wisdom: "I can't live forever / forever's too long."

"I think the hook is going to tend to sound a little morbid to a bunch of people," says Cool Trips in an email to us, "but to me it's about living and dying in moments in a metaphorical sense more than anything... and learning where the high roads are and how to find them. It's strangely positive given all the reminders of inevitable death." And to frame this darker theme, this slice of surreal reality, the kick drum slams overdriven and the tottering bassline skips and dawdles, abrupt atonal synth sweeping sharply above, the vocals call out as if from a different dimension, as if already having died and giving melodic advice from beyond the grave, a slow and steady zombie march of sound.

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• 🔔 You may purchase the fascinating 'Landmark' via Amazon if you so wish. Alternatively, or additionally, you can listen on Spotify. It's taken from Cool Trips' Bloodshot Moon(& The Heart vs Reality) EP.

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🐣 TOBACHI — LABYRINTH [初演 • PREMIERE]

It is something awakening, this track, something birthed from a cosmic egg, reptilian and thin leathery but bright and speckled with pastel colours, and its first motion of life is fluttering, synth zipping along in echoing trills, swerving upwards and then from whatever physical form it holds this egg-born something begins to drop a dramatic soundscape from the sky, something grand, bold, the space between sounds resonating with its majesty. Booming bass kicks rattle the firmament, the sound of a car being beeped unlocked crams some minutiae of reality in the glistening grandeur of it, 15-year-old producer tobachi (aka Tobachi Luke) carving out this biosphere of sound, terraforming on a distant world with thoughts of Earth, a dog barking, some breathy human vocals, and other sounds collaging the nostalgic mind in the midst of all newness.

Space is the big thing here, and lots of it, space and endlessly space. How each sound clacks so much more, booms, explodes, cuts perfectively and zings much more with that hefty canyon of space that lies between each acoustic vibration. However, the threat level increases, chains begin to clink-clank deliciously, some chained monster, some errant ghost, but ultimately this idea of something held back but now moving, poised, ready to escape; the sharp sheafing metallic swish, like a sword being unsheathed, heralds the change into the track's next section, earth-dissolving bass reeling and charging forward whilst samples from Kendrick's 'Swimming Pools (Drank)' beam down, those fizzing synth chords still present from the beginning, and before you know it the storm is over and it is those rapid flutes again, the trilling free-form flight of them, the intensity of those beats and its impacting minimalism ringing in your ears.

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📠
☟ tobachi Internet Presence ☟
soundcloud ⚘ twitter ⚘ instagram ⚘ spotify

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🐣 SARO — LOOKING (CITY FATHER REMIX)

The bristling insectoid sounds of night, the found sounds of the world, the swirls of dust and debris in our everyday waking hours come to life and trickling nocturnal with a moon hanging in the sky seeming to swing like a pendulum. This track certainly is night, unsociable and filled with bustling beats like the unkempt untamed thoughts of a restless mind in the body of a human out walking to put themselves at ease. It's a remix of LA singer Saro's track 'Looking', a much slower number that booms along with heavy walls of synth, as opposed to this frantic and clattering juke-ish rework by fellow LA resident and producer City Father; "I wanted this remix to be like a distorted reflection of the original work," CF tells us in an email. "I tried to respond to its ideas with sounds and textures that would tell the same story, like samples of Saro's breath and field recordings I made wandering around downtown LA in the middle of the night."

And in the new nighttime feel the vocal from the original – "hope you find... what you're looking for" – is the main refrain in this interpretation, now rapid and repeated, bright and hopeful amidst tumbling angular polyhedrons of percussion clacking and bursting for that tarmac pavement (asphalt sidewalk) concrete glass, hard urban materials that give a harshness to the cityscape as much as the beats lend their polisve clatterings to a harshness in the soundscape. Inspired by the "dark" undertones of the original, City Father explains that he wanted to give everything a "hazy, metallic, solitary color" in order to represent the "subtle messages within the original song." So there are bristling impersonal samples, unclaimed and writhing and ambient, the cold textures of the city—and the synth chords, which do not respond to any offerings of company or social gatherings but wait and then walk alone, melancholy and resolute.

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• 🔔 This remix was released in association with Mateo Sound, an artist collective located in LA.

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📠
☟ City Father Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ bandcamp ⚘ twitter ⚘ instagram

☟ Saro Internet Presence ☟
soundcloud ⚘ official site ⚘ twitter ⚘ tumblr ⚘ youtube ⚘ instagram

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🐣 DUCKY — WHAT U SAY

To find a sort of absolutism for sounds and styles of sounds in the music world today is something of a rare thing. Genres have become so fluid and superfluous a notion that, instead of being rallied around and defining a fanbase, they are treated more like palettes, or moodboards, and can be blended in new ways according the artists' desires. And so it is with musicmaker DUCKY. In particular 'What U Say' is a cocktail of chiptune, VGM, dubstep, pop, footwork, drum and bass, an experimental track, as many tracks that make their way into the pages of yes/no tend to be; gone is the label of 'experimental' as mere code for 'abstract' or 'unlistenable', experimental is vibrant and fresh and very online.

But to say that is to discredit the clear leaning towards, or rather the roots in, rave and specifically dubstep and the combination of sweet upbeatness – euphoria – and hard, noisy, quite dark manifestations that loom in both. 'What U Say' begins something like a track from SNES racer Top Gear, triumphal synths blaring overdriven abrasive, pulsing bass bobbling with excitement. It builds, handclaps taking us to the apex from where we plummet into grinding squelching synth and a punchy thudding beat. Vocodered vocals skip like a robotic sirensong. A small bridge where marimba-like chimes resound darkly amidst warm crackles and ominous tides of sub-bass gloop. And at breakneck speed: rapid kicks take us back into the chaos of neon bubblegum high-end melodies and scraping searing synth that storms with the beat.

Delicately, that chiming once more in earshot, DUCKY's track ends. And you realise, despite the squalling dubstep sounds at work, despite the familiar rhythms, it is alive with freshness, with emotivity, illustrating chaos and calm like an electronic symphony.

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• 🔔 The wonderful 'What U Say' is track number 3 on LA-based DUCKY's new EP I Fall In Love With Everyone I Meet, which you can stream and download variously here.

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📠
☟ DUCKY Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ official site ⚘ twitter ⚘ tumblr ⚘ youtube ⚘ instagram

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