Y/N GUEST MIX 015 :: JOLLY MARE

I saw a person on Twitter like last week say something like, "There are too many mixes therefore they are obsolete" – when questioned they cited "inflation" but I think they meant "saturation" maybe. Anyway, it's a ridiculous statement: replace "mixes" with any other thing of which there might too many or too much – food, videogames, paintings – and you can see how. I just thought that would be a nice thing to say cause, like, here's another mix. But I'd really hate to be the one to push you over the edge, so if you think you've heard one mix too many, then go take a cold shower, talk it through with a loved one.

This guest mix is from Fabrizio Faberismi, aka Jolly Mare: an Italian DJ, producer, and a participant in the Red Bull Music Academy 2013. I've also read that he has a PhD in Vibration Dynamics, something that led me to stare at gifs of wobbling catilevered L-beams on the wiki page for 'Vibration'; this might be why in an email he sent to me he described himself as "Something in between a gone-bad scientist and a musician." He also loves old music, and if this mix is anything to go by it's obscure old music in particular that is his penchant.

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I got good taste in music

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Self-confessedly inspired by a "groove, any kind of" when it comes to his own music, it also seems to lead his choices for this wondrous guest mix, itself a lil' under half-an-hour of groovesome entities. Mostly taken from the 1980s, and most you've probably never heard OF let alone actually heard, it runs from the sultry 'Marinero' by Spanish singer Lucía who also provided the Spanish entry, 'Él', for the 1982 Eurovision Song Contest, held in the UK at Harrogate (really weird choice), to the synth-disco of 'Histoire D'un Soir' by Bibi Flash, aka Brigitte Gasté, a French singer active in the '80s. The song really really sounds like Blondie's 'Rapture' – mainly in the rap-singing, the bassline (almost note-for-note), etc.

"There is some freakness in every one of them," says Jolly Mare of the tracks in the mix – and it's true: from the first vital, note-hopping bassline of 'Use My Body' by the unknown Mavis John, through the stretched out, night-anticipating 'Sunset' (L33 and Sven Atterton) and the effortlessly cool remix by Luke Million of The Swiss's summery 'In The City', to the Italo disco of Big Ben Tribe's 'Tarzan Loves The Summer Nights' and the indefatigable soulfunk of 'Better By The Minute' by unlocatable group Glass Pyramid, it's an amalgamation of genres and styles that basically utilise "freakness" as their foundations, namely funk, disco (regular & Italo), soul, boogie, R&B.

What does it demonstrate? "That I got good taste in music," replies Jolly Mare. I mean, well, yeah, these are good songs. And for those of you who are looking for some obscure tracks to boogie the fuck on down to, chill to, do your taxes to, stir fry some noodles to, fix that thing in your car to, clean your living quarters to, whatever to, then don't worry cause this crate-digging mix has done it for you.

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• T R A C K L I S T •

1. Mavis John - Use My Body (1980)
2. L33 & Sven Atterton - Sunset (2013)
3. Lucía - Marinero (1986)
4. The Swiss - In The City (Luke Million Remix) (2014)
5. Desi - I Want To Be With You (1984)
6. Gladys Knight & The Pips - Save the Overtime (For Me) (1983)
7. Big Ben Tribe - Tarzan Loves The Summer Nights (1984)
8. Bibi Flash - Histoire D'un Soir (1983)
9. The McCrarys - Love On A Summer Night (1982)
10. Glass Pyramid - Better By The Minute (1984)

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☟ Jolly Mare Social Media Presence ☟
Facebook • SoundCloud • Twitter • YouTube • Mixcloud

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ONRA – GONNA MAKE YOU MINE

Hmm… you know those days that just seem to float like a nothing-mist, yet zip hastily to their own sunsets? Today is one of those days, and before I've even finished one cup of coffee it seems as though hours have passed by without my noticing their disappearance. Deary deary me. Anyway, we're not here to talk about that. We're here to talk about music. And in particular, we're here to talk about Onra.

Who is Onra? A maker of music of Vietnamese descent who lives in Paris; is that specific enough for you? I wrote about him before, when he created an awesomely slowdown-dreamy remix of Disclosure's 'F For You'. Only checking out his stuff when it appears in front of me, rather than actively seeking it out, I'm surprised that I don't indeed search it out – cause it's real nice yo. This time around we have a tasty little number from a compilation by "brick-and-click" clothing-etc. store Colette called French Kisses; essentially it's a Valentine's Day compilation. 'Gonna Make You Mine' – a romantic title, of course – is Onra's offering to this compilation.

Fading into your mind with a future funk feel – carried by a beat with plunging kicks, crashing snare, skiffly rush of hi-hats – the song is an instant body-mover. At least, for me it is. Maybe I'm just impressionable. But with that bass, bulging and pulsing along with the accented bass drum, it's difficult not to be dragged onto the virtual dancefloor. Minimalist funk chords in popping palm-mutedness whistle by, with occasional saxophone aching into the mix with supreme nocturnal romance flavours — cut-up vocal samples seem to be set to flanger, sounding like a synchronised crowd of voices. That's before the vocal samples proper come in (after a break with sharp-sharp cymbals), singing soulfully with reverb added, dew-dropped with glistens of icy synth.

It's a heavenly sound that takes the "piracy" of hip hop and sets it to work in a less brutal way, preserving sounds and snippets in order to build a neo-soulfunk track, rather than cutting sounds to insert above an equally cut-up beat; this – and some other recent tracks of Onra – suggest that this musicmaker, usually associated with hip hop, is taking a swerving towards something different. Not necessarily something new – just look at the vaporwave pirate-punks and Keats Collective's future funk, for instance – but certainly something full of life and worthy of a larger audience. Also, it just so happens to be a perfect sound for a Valentine's Day compilation: smooth, dance-inducing, flavourful.

You can buy Colette's French Kisses compilation over at their online store (click-click!)

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