🐣 M-CUBED — ACQUAINTANCES

As soon a this track by Atlanta-based M-Cubed starts you sorta know you're in for it, in for something popping and energetic, and that is definitely what you get. What literally first came to mind was Sonic CD (a game what else), specifically the themes for some of the "Bad Future" levels, not that its reminiscent but the futuristic feel of it all, the industrial cog in the machine spirals of grandslam percussion tickety-tickety clackclackclacck thumping diagonal or like a fly bumping into a window, the dystopian flavour of the voxy chord-pads syncopating through the first section, those arpeggiating synths thoughts of digital brains. Got that dark jazzy atmosphere of that soundtrack with the same sorta speed and Sonic you know he's a fast hedgehog isn't he. Chaotic beautiful, yet also very laced with precision and mathematics.

But the track gradually slows down, morphs through a couple of phases, goes from this speedball clatterraucous mayhem into one just a little less busy from 1:25 on, adding these atonal organ chords and hyper little melodies like an injection of Bach. Then 2:07 the beat's accents and ornamentations fly away and leave only a slow nodding beat, gently wobbling electric piano chords warming out the rest of the track as things gradually fall away, the last mechanical sounds of before slowing and distorting at the very end. To arrive at that point from those stuttering robotics and shattering beatscapes of before is astounding, that change in dynamic and feel throughout making this broken beat-feeling half-footwork half-experimental track a playground of sound.

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• This arrived courtesy of M-Cubed of course but it arrives also courtesy of COMPUTER GHOST URL MUSIC, an online music collective. They release electronic computery music on their SoundCloud as far as I can tell.
• The artwork in all its crystalline distortion glory is by ASTRAL, who also created the logo for Computer Ghost URL Music, too. The blue and pink merging in these skeletal lines fit the jagged beatisms of the track, that's for sure.

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☟ M-Cubed Internet Presence ☟
• Facebook • SoundCloud • Bandcamp • official site • Twitter • YouTube •

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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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