CHEAP LOVE HOTEL — OCEAN ACROBATS

When the stars align in breakcore, when the drum fills are scattered in all the right places and appear as seasonal flowers, when the instrumentation sweeps across the soundscape like swathes of cloud-piercing sunshine, when samples pop up like birds flitting between shrubs and treetops, when the bass keeps a simple, effective untiring line as the patterns of planted beds and geometric pathways — wait, this is a garden analogy! And it's one that we are employing to describe 'Ocean Acrobats' by producer CHEAP LOVE HOTEL.

“I love gaming so I make music to help me concentrate and put me in my zone while playing. I don't like dancing and I don't like yoga but I like meditative soundscapes,” the artist writes in their bio. There is no doubt that this music is inspired by the current thread of “PS1 low poly beats” aesthetic that has emerged from the pools of nostalgia gathering in game-related reminiscences of the early 2000s.

Plagued by prolificacy, they allegedly have “so many unreleased tunes ... that my friends had to intervene and started helping me release stuff.” While their entire output is worthy of listening and re-listening, 'Ocean Acrobats' has that meditative feel that puts it on par with ambient music; there is a beat, sure, quite a bustling one, but even this becomes nothing more than a rhythmic texture as the elements in the track begin to melt into one another and into the background. Ambience achieved.

✧

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• 🔔 'Ocean Acrobat' by CHEAP LOVE HOTEL is taken from their most recent release, XOE MY TRUE LOVE which you can stream and purchase digitally over on Bandcamp.

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☟ CHEAP LOVE HOTEL Internet Presence ☟
bandcamp ⚘ instagram ⚘ spotify

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🐣 EUGENE CAM — GRAIN

It's musicmaker extraordinaire Eugene Cam with gis uncompromising, unapologetic fusion of beats and videogame aesthetics. This time around we're at the starting gate, stumbling in a pre-World 1-1 soundscape, a tottering, unstable feel thanks mainly to the producer's ability to put minutely arrhythmic patterns together in an easy-to-catch swaying flow. The kicks thud-thump richly deep, sub-bass bouncing warmly beneath it all, snares crack and hi-hats and other zippy janglings tap-crackle circuitboardly. The beat scuttles along, skittering and pounding, weighted but giving this impression, between each percussive pop, of weightlessness and wall-jumps.

Stars of the show are those synth chords: partially lost to the void and colourful yet abrasive, they provide the perfect scratchy high-end antidote to the lower frequencies in 'Grain'—as does the marimba: gleaming clonking sounds that play mystic melodies, the untitled mystery of what may or may not lie ahead. These arrive whilst the track is calm, there are even people talking in the background; and as the difficulty curve begins to show itself, as the challenge presents itself, the beat grows intense, overdriven, synth wheels over sirenlike.

And the brash boom of the track dies down to its previous intensity, night noises help portray the passing of time, or rather these insectoid whirrings signify just one of a few different areas to a 'hub world' (which is what this track is tagged as). You realise that there is no immediate danger, no actual peril going on here: it's setting the scene for something larger, each differing level of intensity in sound, beat alteration, addition or subtraction of an element, each one could be the basis for a whole tangential level theme. And in that way, 'Grain' sparks imagination, encourages you to fill in the blanks that it itself has created.

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• 🔔 Like this? Well then you literally must check out Eugene Cam's BOOLIN EP from earlier this year. Released on SoundCloud-label Mekaplex it's a pure crossover of trappy beats and videogames with a scrappy spirit and a world-building aesthetic at heart. You gotta check it out. We particularly liked 'The Gate'.
• 🔔 Oh and in case you didn't know: Eugene Cam made this LIVE on Twitch. V impressive!

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📠
☟ Eugene Cam Internet Presence ☟
facebook ⚘ soundcloud ⚘ bandcamp ⚘ twitter ⚘ youtube ⚘ instagram ⚘ spotify

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🐣 CHRONO TRIGGER OST — SECRET OF THE FOREST (LEON EDIT)

The slow and breezy original 'Secret of the Forest' is a track taken from SNES game Chrono Trigger, playing in Guardia Forest; it conjures the freshness of nature and its greenery, the dappled light and leaf shadows faintly swaying on the ground mirrored in the glistening arpeggio that chimes throughout, spreading at the same time with its ambivalent pattern of notes a veil of mystery; the piano midway is steady with jazz flavour, reflecting a sort of laid-back tranquillity that goes with chilled nature; there's wheeling high-pitched melody with lingering glissando that feels like birds swooping and singing. It's almost spiritual.

But there's this deep fragmented bass and a semblance of percussion that gives it this poised edge, like something's about to kick in—the dense forest as not only chilled hideaway for humans, but a place of vague looming danger, too. And that's where Leon comes in. Increasing the tempo of the track, this musicmaker introduces a robust boom-bap flavoured beat to the gleaming soundscape, picking out the distinct but sparse groove of the bassline and carving into something full-bodied with thudding kicks and abrasive snares; turntablist edits pockmark the new jogging-paced 'Secret of the Forest' for extra texture, the swing-beat breeziness matching the irresolute magic of the glittering florafauna conjured in the instrumental.

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• 🔔 Little thing: the description for Leon's edit simply reads: items: strength capsule (2), shelter — Nice inventory~
• 🔔 The creator of the Chrono Trigger soundtrack, Yasunori Mitsuda, got the job after he told then-Square vice president Hironobu Sakaguchi that he would quit if he couldn't compose (he had worked on sound design for previous titles such as Final Fantasy V and Secret of Mana). Sakaguchi agreed, and Mitsuda ended up composing all 54 tracks for the Chrono Trigger OST, working so hard on it that he gave himself stomach ulcers.
• 🔔 For a masterpiece from Leon you should check out his album bird world, made especially for a game that had been imagined but never made; and it makes you think of that uncreated game and how it would be to play it. Listen to that splendidly fun soundtrack over on Leon's SoundCloud.

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📠
☟ Leon Internet Presence ☟
soundcloud ⚘ bandcamp ⚘ twitter ⚘ instagram ⚘ spotify

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JD SENUTI – TOKYO R246

Before we even go anywhere, yes JD SenuTi is DJ iTunes backwards. If you know a few things about online music, you'll know that DJ iTunes was an actual person, a component of the future funk offshoot of the vaporwave community. Now the account's been shut down, the real question is: are DJ iTunes and JD SenuTi the same person? My guess is yes and they went the same way as Saint Pepsi (RIP), who had to change his name to Skylar Spence after Pepsi Co. kindly asked him to do so.

Anyway. Whatever, you know? Whatever… So we're here for 'Tokyo R246' – named after a course on Gram Turismo (plus it is also a real place) – which is fittingly pulsing with read-to-race eyeballs-to-the-tarmac high-octane downforceish power. Downforce: that's a motorsport term. And there's a quote in the SoundCloud description of the track, one from The Fast And The Furious. It doesn't get more... car-based than all that.

Resounding hi-hats glitter and pop through the crackling white noise of the track, the millisecond thoughts and decisions of racing swirling as conjured by the smart and squiffy synth wibbles. Heartbeat kicks punctuate with abrasive kicks, all of it high-velocity and underpinned by body-vibrating bass bloops that play out the kind of melody that suits a challenge, suits a gritted-teeth race-to-the-finish triumph, the joy of fast cars and urgency of competition fully at work in this retro-futuristic number.

And you know what? I don't even have a driving license, but I have an imagination.

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• If you're loving the fruit-based artwork, check JD SenuTi's SoundCloud – there's plenty more where that came from.
• In particular, a recent album called Rendered Fruit, released via label Business Casual, will probably catch your interest if you are of the vaporwavey persuasion.

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☟ JD SenuTi Social Media Presence ☟
SoundCloud • Twitter

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LINDSAY LOWEND – BASEMENT DWELLER OVERTURE

LEAPING LIZARDS! How did I miss this? I mean, I'm sorry for saying "leaping lizards" – I don't think I've ever said it before and I'll be damned if I ever say it again. Sorry. But in all seriousness: how did I miss this? Rhetorical question, mind you; reckon there's a whole load of reasons why I missed it, the main one being I just wasn't vigilant enough. Gotta stay vigilant. If you want to hear nice sounds, gotta keep an ear to the ground. Not the ground but at least in the direction of music sources. SoundCloud for example. Not fucking Vice magazine, that's for sure.

Words words words that's all I'm saying wordy word-word word. And they mean pretty much nothing, too. However, let's break the cycle and say some meaningful words; not in the poignant, single-tear-tumbling-down-a-soft-cheek kind of meaningful, but meaningful as in the "has meaning" sense. So, I wrote about Lindsay Lowend's Wind Fish EP after I a) freaked out about the name of the EP, b) freaked out about the music of the EP, and c) freaked out with regards to both of these things. I'm a Zelda fan (sorry if u hate but haha on you u suk) so it was natural to check it out. The sound was like nothing I'd heard before so I just wrote like a madman until I was limp and dried up like washed up sea cucumber. And I waited for more stuff to appear and it didn't so I treasured the EP and listened to it a lot.

FLASH FORWARD to five minutes ago and I played Lindsay Lowend's latest 'Basement Dweller Overture' for literally a couple of seconds (I enjoyed it nonetheless), but I'm tired right now and want/need to go to bed/do something else. Flash forward to a full day later and I'm writing this again, but now in the safe wakefulness of daytime.

The song begins with this indomitable bounce led more by the bass than the beat itself, which forms a nicely styled backdrop to the whole thing, the drums themselves thick and meaty. Something about the synthwork in this song is clean as anything – there is no dust to be found – surgical precision leads the way, with vocal samples or at least what sound like vocal samples sliced and diced and spread skillfully around like a clean mosaic of a buffet. The drums leave wonderful offbeat trails, oozing the heft of dubstep. But halfway through, what the egg happens? A piano solo; virtuosic and rich, it detaches your ears from the previous playground of electronic noises in that nodding-head hip-hop style beat, bringing you into a world where the music speaks for itself, painting colours of wonder and imagination.

That's before you're thrown into a chunk of electro-funk, filled with buzzing and elephant trumpeting sounds in a glorious section of glitch-laden cut-up style, filling your ears until the inspirational few notes that play at the end. There's always something intensely satisfying when you listen to a Lindsay Lowend song – maybe it's just me, but he seems to be able to conjure the same magic as the best videogame soundtrack without having to rely on any visuals whatsoever. His music is defined by jazz sensibilities – breaking off at tangents, having no main theme, exuding a wholly improvisational talent. It seems as though, with this in mind, this is the music of nerds or geeks or let's just say "the marginalised" – especially with this particular title, like an anthem for hikikomori – but then there are elements that boast the swagger of hip hop, the popular glitchgasm of dubstep, or juke's quick-step addictiveness, which throws any listener off with regards to pegging this in any particular genre or indeed annexing it for the benefit of some appreciation group or another.

What this really is… well it's the sound of a generation. It mirrors years of drip-feeding on popular culture and overstimulation thanks to gaming and the internet, retaining a retro nostalgia that makes for a clash of pre- and post-internet mindsets quite evident in the frenetic and wildly imaginative tracks from Lindsay Lowend.

BTW The awesome 80s-themed, souped-up Earthbound-Zelda style artwork was done by German sibling duo, Low Bros.

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TRIM NOTICE NOW (EONE'S RAIDERS OF THE LOST DARK REFIX)

I came back and then I went away again then came back again and disappeared for like a week but here I am. Yes, I have proverbially returned. It has been a chilled time but all chills must come to an end – one cannot chill forever. And although I posted a new track on New Year's Day ('Everything Happens To You' by miii) it was kind of a stand-alone thing. So now here's something to properly start 2014. It's something dark and stormy and it's from the Brighton producer himself, Eone.

Whilst it's not an original, it shows an interesting side to this man's sound. When I first stumbled across his sounds, I was under the impression that he made a dark brand of techno and only that, but after I listened to his guest mix for YES/NO it was clear that his tastes and influences ran wider and deeper than I'd imagined – grime and hip hop played a large part in his musical repertoire. And it's displayed most of all in this newest track, something old rediscovered and uploaded – as such, it's new. A refix of 'Notice Now' by rapper Trim, previously part of super grime collective Roll Deep, Eone injects the track – previously an electronically charged number with dubstep flavours – with a new bass-laden ethnic ornamentation.

Trim's swarthy, plosive vocals are extracted from the original's zeitgeistical dubstep surroundings and placed in a deep creeping basement of shadowy reverb, where an atonal, grimey bassline leads into bristling swathes of percussion – shakers, drums, tinny hits, a waterfall of sound that gives this essentially urban medium of art a faraway exotic twist, something from another dimension almost. And it reminds me a little bit of the music for Hazy Maze Cave from Super Mario 64 – man I'm just listening to it now and it's almost a perfect match. The name is really nice too: 'Raiders of the Lost Dark'.

Anyway, it shows another side to Eone and one that I hope he'll revisit soon, cause I know this is an old song. Perhaps these flavours will be revitalised, and perhaps there'll be more remixes/fixes like this, too. Bye-bye!

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Like Eone on Facebook
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Follow Trim on Twitter
Read about Trim on Wikipedia

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