Since releasing her highly anticipated debut album, Lights Out, in 2011, Londoner-by-way-of-Chicago Kate Simko has persistently worked to establish her position on the forefront of dance music. Known for her unique take on house and techno, Simko has continued to demonstrate her diverse musical prowess with each and every release.
Since video surfaced of Damian Lazarus unleashing our favorite Hot Natured track to date (or at least 2013′s best track to date), we’ve been combing the internet’s wasteland of misinformation searching for a release date, but, lo!—like a feral unicorn mystically appearing in an enchanted forest, it was delivered to the BP servers for our repeated preview listening.
Bloc Party’s “Truth” was once a straight-ahead indie-pop jam with an insistent guitar line and a pretty fun vocal melody. But now that Digitalism have got their hands on it, it’s naturally been given a bit of a facelift for the dancefloor.
Dubstep duo Mt. Eden (formerly Mt. Eden Dubstep) started off as bedroom producers, slowly putting New Zealand dubstep on the map. Now with over 100 million collective views on their tracks on YouTube, they’ve dropped the “Dubstep” from their name, signed to Ultra Records, and have an EP due in June.
Of the many great things that Omar-S has mastered, breaking new acts through his inimitable FXHE imprint has been one of the most notable: the likes of Luke Hess, Jason Fine, Kyle Hall, and Big Strick were all given a big boost early in their careers via FXHE’s lo-fi hotcakes. Aaron “FIT” Siegel was the most recent name added to that list last year with the massive hit “Tonite.” It’s an instantly memorable, all-out and unbridled celebration of classic house music, with the Detroit Mix in particular causing peak-time damage with squawking horns, thundering pianos, and a one-word singalong. Returning with his new eponymous label, Fit Sound, Aaron “FIT” Siegel offers a glimpse into the genesis of “Tonite,” with an early sketch of the track that is enhanced with Omar-S’s studio wizardy.
Velvet Elvis’ Late Night Loco remix of [a]pendics.shuffle’s “Heavy Burdens High” is a chilling and haunting interpretation of the original. Starting with a simple reverbed piano loop atop steady, rounded kick drums, the intro sets an immediate atmospheric tone. Interestingly enough, the track has no bass, so the lows you hear are percussion-driven, creating a tropical dreamscape of sounds. The instrumental adds to the bitter, lover-scorned vocals, provided by Blakkat (aka Mark Bell). And as they waft in and out of each soulful stanza, the marimbas’ melody is as memorable as the lyric, “Who really cares if you’re high?”
Sometimes the only thing a room needs is a groove, and Philip Bader, a master architect of deep, playful swing provides just what any early-morning warehouse needs with his latest through Moon Harbour, “Crazy.”
Dutch brothers Victor and Stephan Leicher, better known as producing duo DubVision, are quickly establishing themselves as major players in the progressive-house scene. Their first single, “All By Myself,” and their remix of Discopolis’ “Committed to Sparkle Motion” became mainstays in festival and clubs sets. Avicii opened his set at Ultra Music Festival this year with DubVision’s remix of his hit with Nicky Romero, “I Could Be The One.” DubVision’s latest original track “Redux,” released March 8 on Spinnin Records, was a hit at UMF as well, and is sure to be in heavy rotation at festivals this summer.
Swiss producer Deetron grew up listening to his father’s jazz records and the sounds of Detroit’s Kevin Saunderson and Carl Craig. Once he discovered production in the late ’90s, his dramatic techno and house sound landed him releases on Music Man, Carl Cox’s Intec, and many more leading labels. Towards the end of last year, Music Man gave us the pleasure of “Crave,” Deetron’s first single from his forthcoming album. Finally, the next single, a deliciously house number entitled “Out Of My Head,” comes to us featuring vocals from Ovasoul7, and it’s today’s Track of the Day.
Sometimes it sucks being young. Case in point: LA producer Justin Jay, who got his first break in 2010 when he won a DJ contest sponsored by DJ Mag, but was turned away from playing the honorary gig because he was under 18. But that’s not gonna hold him back, of course, and at just 19, he’s proving quite a worthy member of the dirtybird crew.
