CATT MOOP – CATT MOOP #1

It's sometimes like really difficult to describe where things actually come from, who made them, what the point of such and such a release is, blah blah blah, it's just tricky. Gotta research things if you wanna properly know but sometimes the answers just aren't there.

Luckily they [the answers] are um kinda here with this track from Atlanta-based beatmaker Catt Moop (love the name – what does it mean? idk – the word "moop" just sounds great). Seemingly created for a newish SoundCloud page called FOODFIGHT, it has no name and arrives in a series presumably under FOODFIGHT's bio: "beat battles for fun!"

I like the idea behind it. Just nice and innocent food fights, I mean beat battles.

'Catt Moop #1' is a cool track. It is sunk with vibrating sub-bass, a moody mire upon which synth bleeps do their thing, pockmarked with nifty little dynamics, like a complete cut out of the volume or a gradual slow-down with the synth gradually reverbing more and more and imploding in on itself. And at the beginning there's a brilliant muted shout of FOOOD FIIIGHT! Yeah! LET'S GET MESSY!

It reminds me of a few things, which I will list now. It reminds me of Mr. Oizo-style French touch kinda stuff, with a cheeky melody that belies a certain idgaf swagger, pointy and electronic and sometimes decaying with squeaky distortion. It also reminds me of the minimal beats of London grime – a repetitive (and cheeky but we don't have to say it cause I already said so) melody against slow swaying beats. Then again, the actual rhythm is more trap than anything. So there you go – a cocktail of attitudinal flavours.

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Catt Moop is also one half of musicmaking duo, HYDERABADD. Check em out.

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☟ Catt Moop Social Media Presence ☟
SoundCloud • Twitter • Tumblr • YouTube

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FAILR – GAVE UP

BOM… CRRK… BOM–BOM–CRRK… It's embarrassing enough just imagining myself beatboxing out-loud and in front of people, but now I'm worried that I haven't typed it right – is it onomatopoeically correct? Yeah just so you know it's supposed to be like, this huge sparse beat. Sigh, anyway, that's how I feel after listening to this song.

What song? Well it is a song by a person called Failr, also named Warwick (the real name of this Sydney-based person), and the song is called 'Gave Up'. It gets its name from the cyclical sample used throughout the track, smooth silky vocals contrasting against the hard thudding beats (could you not tell from my literal beatboxing?) which are the very effective bedrock to this track, each kick a veritable blockbuster right hook, each snare a scathing slap. These play around with sombre lounge-esque piano chords, soft and warm, giving a lethargic attitude to the track that fits its defeatist title.

What I like about this is not only its thumping drums – punctuated by skittering hi-hats, and later on mobilising themselves double-time into an uptempo house rhythm – its hard style, but its simplicity: at its heart this is drums, piano, sample – a triumvirate of noise. Of course, there is a little more going on than just this, the fizzing white noise flapping ominously throughout the second half, the just-discernable bassline. With that in mind, you'll also notice that nothing is really repeated or looped so much – repetition falls by the wayside here for more of an experiment with different parts to the song, keeps things interesting.

This comes from Failr's first collection of sounds, the 5-track Lark EP – here he plays with sampling as well as with this style of satisfyingly punchy beats; personally I thought 'Gave Up' was the best example. The name of the EP is quite fitting, as larks (the bird) in literature symbolise daybreak which metaphorically ties in with the "dawn" of this project; on the other hand, it is an old-fashioned thing in Chinese culture for larks to be taught to mimic the sounds of other birds, thus tying in with the sampling side of things; still further, "a lark" is synonymous with "a laugh" or "some fun", so that could work too. Anyway! That's that.

• You can download this for name-ur-price at Failr's Bandcamp
• Failr/Warwick also founded & runs Lonely Kids Club, an independent clothing label based in Sydney

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ASHNIKKO – DAMSEL [FREE DOWNLOAD]

Something out of the blue and interesting for you, here's something I found just crawling through the tunnels of SoundCloud as you do. It's some rap, essentially. It's not only good, it's also a combination of things worth making some noise about. One of which is that the rapper herself is from North Carolina but lives in Riga, Latvia.

Yeah, anyway, this is the sound of Ashnikko, real name Ashton Casey, and she's really good. Her flow is elastic and plosive and sharp all at the same time, at least this is what I can glean from this particular 3-month-old track (vintage Ashnikko), 'Damsel'. As you might be able to tell from the title, it deals with the stereotype damsel-in-distress, stamping on it and throwing up a lightning barrage of middle fingers to, and laughs at, its endorsers and practitioners.

Her voice twangs clear and crisp, almost drawling her superconfident lines, of which there are so many clever ones, with slow, spelled-out icy delivery, steeped in carefully considered rhyme. Some that stick out: "Girl you so cute, why you talkin' so morbid? / I'm the female Cookie Monster but I'm snacking' on corpses" – "You're happy with that job and your subservient wife" – and "Your savage master cackling madly as he checks in with his drones." But really, it's totally brimming with this type of confrontational intellect and I love it.

This is all set to a low-key beat, booming out sub-bass foundation and ticking snare punctuation for Ashnikko's bars, courtesy of Latvian beatmaker Toms Slukins. Adding barely perceptible vox to the end of the track is about its only variation, but it totally works – Ashnikko is the star of the show here, but Toms' production goes with it like the sky to a cluster of clouds: pretty perfectly.

This comes from Karaļūdens 01, a compilation of rap and hip hop from Riga music collective Dirty Deal Audio released at the end of last year. You might not understand Latvian, but you are a human and you are free to like or dislike patterns of speech, and surely you can like a beat or two without knowing what's going on lyrically. (Sure helps though. *sigh bc i don't know all the languages*)

PS. You can download this for free
PPS. There's also a video for this

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KA-YU – UNXSUAL

Ah wow, so yeah, hmm…! This is nice. This is really nice. And if you're getting tired of my continual surprise at finding incredible stuff that I never knew existed, then maybe you should get some childlike wonder of your own and stop being such an "adult" – woo look at you, all cynical and that, must feel pretty growned-up! You must get regular haircuts too! (The collective "you", no-one in particular).

That aside, this track 'UNXSUAL' really is nice. It's from a producer called KA-YU, who is a Moluccan (islands in Indonesia) / Dutch guy from a little place in the Netherlands called Oosterwolde. Real name Woody Latuheru, he's done something that I've always wondered about: remixed his own track. Yep, he's only gone and done it. And not only that, the original track – called 'Temptations' – is essentially a remix itself, heavily sampling the rich harmonies from Beyoncé's 'Rather Die Young'. It's a remix within a remix, a film within a film, a dream within a dream, and whilst not as confusing as that last one, it sure is as mesmerising.

Exploding in your ears, it's an instant hit, a total dopamine-engager, cradling your heart in its arms as it gets down and gets moving, your spirit inextricably linked in the very moment of now. Vocal cuts like orchestra hits blast out above the clacking roll-sway of a juke-flavoured beat, rumbling drone sub-bass gripping you in its apocalyptic frequency all the way. A gun fires three quarters through. "Oh my god" says a voice; "Aww, shit!" says another. This song knows its own immensity and it brims, pulses with confidence.

Well uh that was that. Happy? I am. And I'm also definitely looking forward to hearing more from KA-YU, which will be in the near future. Recently joining the Art In Melodies family/collective alongside four other musicmakers in the Netherlands, a new EP is currently in the works – check out this snippet of a very intergalactic-sounding remix of Brandy's 'I Wanna Be Down' taken from that upcoming release.

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BRETON FORCE OF HABIT EP

Am I being a bit Breton-heavy recently? If you think I am focusing on them too much, then I'm really sorry and I don't know how you'll ever forgive me. If you don't think I'm focusing on them too much, like if you've never read this damn blog before, then don't worry about what I'm saying. I was worried but now I literally don't care. I'm going to write about Breton again and again and again until I'm sick of writing about them and their music loses all meaning to me – now that's dedication, don't you think?

But recently London band Breton have been doing quite a few things so writing about them often is unavoidable, well, it is unavoidable if you happen to like Breton. And you'd be a cynical fool for not allowing yourself to like them. Cause they ARE good. But then again: is everything just an opinion? I'd like to think no – sometimes things just are the way they are, no matter what a certain amount of people think about it. But what am I saying? I'm sorry again. What I mean to say is: prior to the release of their upcoming album War Room Stories, out 3rd February next year, Breton have sneakily dropped an EP titled Force of Habit.

Officially released yesterday, Breton frontman Roman Rappak – who tackled a YES/NO interview the other week – describes the EP as a "16 minute introduction to our love of hiphop, films, guitar music and massive hooks." Including the wildly different but equally brilliant 'Envy' – a tropico-disco indie math medley – and synth-laden 'Got Well Soon', with its nocturnal heft, the EP leads you by the hand through a small but very cool museum of Breton's varied sound.

Minus the strong, hip-hop-inflected beat of 'Sticker Factory', complete with wonderfully industrial sounding cymbal taps, its orchestral arrangements – which come courtesy of a 44-piece orchestra called upon just for this occasion – could work perfectly just by themselves. It's a superbly rich and all-encompassing sound, growing from a street-level tune with a cool bassline and attitudinal vocals into a veritable symphony of drama, the strings soaring into a an emotional and indeed quite filmic climax. This is something that I'd imagine would take over your whole mind if you saw it live; a powerful atmospheric track, this one.

To finish things off, the wholly unorchestral-and-it-knows-it swagger of 'Plot Device' rings with atonal, buzzing synths and dread quakes of bass, all set to no-nonsense hip-hop drums. It is dramatic, not in the same way as 'Sticker Factory' of course, but it plays with the same dynamics that gangster rap employs in its brutal beats that ring with polished sheen. It's an ear-burster and it's glorious.

From indie dance and electropop, to orchestral rock and hip hop, this Force of Habit EP has it all; for a band to be so varied in their sound, and to accomplish these variations with undeniable finesse, is not only rare but wonderfully enjoyable and refreshing. Creativity is often about finding your own "voice" or sticking to a particular style – Breton here, I think, prove that you can "do" any style you want, enter any genre, so long as it is a genuine love of yours (otherwise people would notice that you're trying too hard), and if not add elements of it into your music, then completely embody that genre for the duration of an entire song. You're limited by your tastes and that's all.

I looked around but I don't actually know where you can get this from. Maybe it's just a streaming thing. Yeah it probably is. Unless you illegally obtain music from sites. In which case you're v naughty.

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LIQUID.SUNSHINE (天照汁御神) LIVE @ 2.5D // LIQUID.SUNSET

I heard liquid.sunshine, aka 天照汁御神 (please what does this mean?) aka Hosh'ki Tsunoda, a few days ago in a live show on 2.5D, an internet channel based in Shibuya, Tokyo, that hosts all sorts of live performances in the name of art and culture. His cosmic and wholly encompassing experimental approach to hip hop pretty much made my day that day - it was a Wednesday. It wasn't actually that long ago at all. But all the same: I loved it.

Luckily Meishi Smile, owner of ZOOM/LENS label/collective and maker of music himself, captured the live sights and sounds of this very interesting set and uploaded it to YouTube. Saying that it begins with a sample of Fred Durst saying "chocolate starfish...!" will give you a small inkling as to the influences (yes, nu-metal) at work on Hosh'ki Tsunoda. In any case, I urge you to stick this on and have a listen to it. You will enjoy it a lot. Well, maybe you won't, but if you like instrumental hip hop with an intergalactic slant that dips its toes into the choppy sea of electronic experimentalism, whilst retaining the brash beats of retro hip hop, you probably will like this.

In other news, Mr Tsunoda released an EP called liquid.sunset - it is a collection of accomplished beats that swim in seas of luscious electro sounds. Here, let me talk you through it from the beginning to the end.

'Seashore Mosaic' captures the sound of literal waves crashing against the sand, but in synth chord form; it also captures the sound of seagulls cawing, but in a much more aesthetically pleasing series of wah-wah synth leads. A very nice break in the drums explodes about 1:20 on this one, leading the way for a bustling second half that has all the cheer of a jolly jaunt by the seaside. Against a crackling backdrop, there are super-high-register clicks to accompany to the beat right to the end.

Those clicks, and more besides, shine out of the beat of 'Visitor at 2am' - there's more of that cheerfulness, too, albeit in a different form: not a fresh day sun-in-your-face cheer, but one of seeing a friendly face at an unexpected point in the night. It's a mildly pulsing and tentative happiness in the slow rhythm here, in the gently bulging bass synth, the lo-fi chords and sparkling leads.

That slowness continues as a blissful hangover in 'Sphere', whose crackles and liquid drips of ambient noise flow underneath a swaggery saw-wave bass, delayed synth blips and 16-bit spears of dramatic gleaming sound. Organic acoustic sounds mark a change in dynamic here, where big taiko drum sounds steal the show from the earlier hip hop shuffle of the beat. Towards the end, all of the sounds of the song layer into a rich, almost overwhelming waterfall of sound.

The hypnotic world of 'Headphones', a mesmerisation of flanging space-age synth that wraps you in the otherworldly isolation that can occur whilst wearing headphones. Not unsurprisingly, it sounds really nice with headphones on. Glitching blips and stabs of digital pads puncture the staccato baseline.

Claps ahoy in next track 'Breathe In', whose beat is a bustling, syncopated foray into a floating world of glitzy swagger - a soft, unintelligible vocal sample hangs like mist in the midst of the clangour of this track. Another expertly woven tapestry of layered sounds that compliment each other like cherry pie and ice cream.

'Lusty Lusty' finishes the journey of liquid.sunset with a gentle track that is sunken in the depths of some smooth sub-bass. Beginning with a sparse, 4/4 rhythm, it mutates by the end through some nice offbeats into something with more attitude, warming up as it goes along, a stuttering sound like a robotic dove cooing spirals in and out of earshot; the end is as charming and cutesy as the start, with popping, muted synth bops to see us out.

See? It sounds nice doesn't it? Keep an eye out for more from this guy, I don't think he's quite finished yet - usually, with such an inquisitive mind as goes with experimenting with sounds, there's a lot more for them to explore in the future. So I look forward to more.

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BRETON GOT WELL SOON [VIDEO]

How can something so good stay so hidden for so long? Well that's one question I ask myself about a lot of music sometimes. It's all out there, just waiting to be discovered, and there you are, all the time, waiting to be told about it, shown it, played it. One of my friends told me to check out Breton and I did but I couldn't find anything new that they've done. But then it turned out that they released a new song a few days ago so I was pretty happy to hear something new.

They're from... I don't know. They seem to have a substantial following in France but they definitely seem to be English. Who knows. You can tell me. Please do, if you know. Anyway, one thing is for sure: Breton have made a very mean-sounding, strong sound for their new single 'Got Well Soon' - the video is steeped in the amateur yet visceral atmosphere of young criminality and suits the sound perfectly. Have yourself a little watch of it. But as for the music, the first thing that jumps out is that bass synth. There's something balefully heraldic about it, in the way that it sounds a little like a horn, but there is something unnerving, something not-quite-right about it too, and that's perhaps in the slightly-trebled pitch-bending heart of this particular noise. It's the first thing that jumps out and possibly the song's most addictive sound.

Alongside this dark, gritty sound that conjures images of rudeboys walking tough, a we-mean-business atmosphere, there is a beat that is wholly disco: woodblocks clink alongside sharp hi-hats and the thumping alternation between kick & snare. The vocals, too, lend themselves to the rough-and-ready appeal that the bass already establishes, unpolished and legion as they are, summoning the dark-pavement feel of street-born chants of aggression yet with a confident laid-back swagger in the lilts of the chorus.

Clean arpeggios of electronic beeps and a fat saw-wave bass solo towards the end provide the tenets of electropop - albeit dark electropop brimming with attitude - that make this such a catchy number. Add to that the winding synth that makes you wanna turn this aaall the way up and the lush disco beat and you have 'Got Well Soon' - an honest, genreless tune that is surely only a sign of good (better?) things to come.

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LIDLY TIME

Not only is it now Lidly time, as in 'it's time for Lidly', but it is also 'Time' by Lidly - fun isn't it? Now that we've got that cleared up, I'm very happy to introduce to you - whomever you happen to be - the fantastic beats of Tokyo producer, Lidly. I think I've probably said his names enough times now, so that'll be all for the moment anyway.

First time I stumbled across him was when I wrote about Taiwanese rapper Aristophanes貍貓's stunning track 'The Peach Blossom', which was produced by this Japanese beat-maker. It was clear then that his sampling and beat structures could do more than just compel you to bop your head: they could make you feel stuff as well. FEEL stuff. Imagine that. And that's always a good sign when it comes to someone who's known for making beats for other artists to sing/rap over. His beats, and beats are often just fanciful metronomes, are blankets of sound that can stand firmly on their own two feet. (If that is as many feet as a beat has).

When Aristophanes shared my article on her FB page, someone commented on it and said that they "hated" the Lidly beat: "makes my teeth hurt," they said. Well. Their teeth must be super sensitive to GREAT BEATS. That or they have utterly no taste.

Anyway, recently (like a few days ago) Lidlyさん released an album/mixtape called The Shabby Neophilia. There are so many great sounds on there, trippy multi-faceted sample-heavy hip hop that glows with attitude. But one really stood out to me and blew me away so I'm gonna write about this one. It's called 'Time' as you probably have guessed already and it sounds like dis...

Sullen organ sounds noodle with incomprehensible everyday-life kinda samples and crashing lazy cymbals before the song busts out. To a stumbling buzz of a bassline a hip hop beat drags itself through the song, ripping tearing along like someone with velcro socks staggering along a path of more velcro. Inescapable harsh claps and fizzy hi-hats.

The star here is, however, the intense scale and emotion of the synth chords. They hit you like a classical piece would, so expert is their progression within the song, except there's more depth here than a regular, non-electronic instrument could give you; the chords are broken, torn, distorted and, at the end, begin switching between left and right, chasing each other down, before fading with an echo. They give, moreover, a maudlin kind of sound: it has a feeling-sorry-for-myself vibe but there's a twist of glory and triumph that perfectly suits the majestic-yet-debilitating mystery of Time.

So... go listen to The Shabby Neophilia - u won't regret it.

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KAVINSKY PROTOVISION [VIDEO]

Kavinsky - otherwise known as the real world person Vincent Belorgey - is back with a new album due out early 2013: Outrun. This, 'Protovision', is the first official single from that album - 'Odd Look', a snippet of which we covered a few weeks ago, has actually not been released yet. But, all these technicalities and names aside, I'm just glad to hear that he's back. It seems that a lot of people are giving him a pretty hard time for "pulling a DRIVE" in the video below, but if you've followed Kavinsky for a while, you will see that Kavinsky is itself a creation by Vincent: both the music and the eponymous character form part of the atmosphere that goes with the whole package that is Kavinsky.

Whether or not you like or can even get on board with a conceptual idea like that is besides the point (no matter how cool or not cool you think it is): the point is the music. And as far as the music that comes from the mind of this guy goes, it remains an exciting, dynamic sound that doesn't pull any punches and that remains almost as it has been since the release of his first EP Teddy Boy in 2006.

So in 'Protovision' we are treated to an epically wailing guitar, which is the main star of the 3-minute-long thumper of a track. In typical Kavinsky style we hear a super strong beat that thuds along beneath a grim, fuzzy wave of synth bassline - a showcase of 80s-car-chase-inspired sounds that display and illustrate as much excitement as inspires them in the first place. The only change that has been made to the sound since previous tracks is perhaps a larger dash of wide and epic, cinematic atmosphere that has managed to have been captured within the glowering synth of 'Protovision', yet still it is the small touches that make the most differences sometimes.

Detractors might say that Kavinsky is always the same - if you don't like that sound, then lack of change is bound to annoy you. Personally, I think this sound is one that Vincent Belorgey should tenaciously cling onto and hold close because it's one that, like a loveable or memorable character, people will not tire of hearing.

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