"IF YOU WANT A VISION OF THE FUTURE, IMAGINE CRAP 808 SAMPLES STAMPING ON A HUMAN FACE- FOREVER"
All City
Dublin might be an unlikely home-away-from-home for LA, but All City are doing their damnedest to rep the beats capital hard. What could be a stronger love-in than a series of ten 10”s showcasing twenty of LA’s mad scientist beatsmakers? You might have become aware of All City after last years awesome 7x7 series (they clearly love their square numbers) which knocked out great releases from Hudson Mohawke, Mike Slott and Onra, amongst others. If not, get to know.
Coming in strong on the first side is Dibiase with a set of woozy and wonked instrumental killers. Dibiase’s beats run the gamut from warped Super Mario World refits to sluggish Dilla tropes, taking in all manner of samples however ill advised they might seem. An MJ snippet on Thrilla Time Slime runs precariously close to the edge of wackness, but along with A Team appearences and some bizarre, 8 bit, pitch bent madness, the side evokes wicked, weed haze humour rather than gauche nerdiness. Some skronked out basslines and ghostly laughter inject the boom bap with some Scooby Doo haunted house hoodoo whilst laser samples on Spacely Sprocketts demonstrate the dorky inversion of gunshot hip hop bravado Low End Theory is reknown for.
It’s P.U.D.G.E who runs away with the prize on the flip though, with some space age excursions into psychedelic pastures. One-upping the spectral shimmer Ras G shoots for by painting his beats fluorescent, P.U.D.G.E drenches the likes of AwnMyDawn in rainbow stardust, riding an audacious beat straight to Saturn. Whilst some might be accusatory of some Brainfeeder aping going on, it’s to P.U.D.G.E’s credit that he condenses all of the (in fact quite disparate) producers on Flying Lotus’ roster into one crunchy, idea filled headspace. The collaboration with Dibiase that closes the 10” is almost too packed, its malfunctioning drum machines, epic swells and ADD soul sampling coming on like Bullion relentlessly eating his way through all of the LA crews’ studios and samples.
Killer 10”, and only the first of ten!
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