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Ethnofusion Picks #March2016

April 1, 2016 - Blog
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What’s up everyone? It’s your intergalactic robot alien boy, Baxtak, reporting live for Outtallectuals from the deepest depths of Soundcloud, bringing you those soul-twerkicising darbuka rhythms and air-daf-drumming extravaganza with this edition of Ethnofusion. I’ve been doing my thing, compiling all the dankest world fusion music I heard in the past month, and bringing it to your ears. Without further rambles, here are the month’s picks. Hope you enjoy:

Ethnic Dub

Audeka – Mushrooms Are Alien Probes

Well who knew, seems like Audeka taking a bunch of shroomies is a pretty good formula for dope ethnofusion music. Just out of nowhere, they came out with this nearly 7 minute epic, that has a bit of everything in it. It’s pretty crazy how good it sounds and how little it sounds like anything else. The crazy polyrhythmic patterns of the groove sound like something out of an Amazonian Mad Max rendition, with wet forest tribal sounds dribbling all over the soundscape, and Terrence McKenna’s voice practically guiding you through the song. Its equal parts uplifting, scary and sacred, something quite telling of psilocybin experiences and it’s definitely one of my favourite Audeka tunes already, and a definite favourite of this month.

Mantis Mash – Simplexity EP

First of all, let’s get this out of the way… that EP name is freaking great. It also gives a perfect indication of what this album sounds like. On the surface, it’s easy on the ears, highly melodic, and meditative, and for those tech-mongrels looking for something intricate and heavy on the design depths, there’s enough in Mantis Mash’s complex bag of tricks to keep you guessing all throughout this. There’s a little bit of everything psychedelic in this; fluid-like falling arpeggios, wubapsy basses, squelches, stuttering melodies, hypnotic bending lead keys, flutes, mystically chip-tuned vocals, lots of delayed, echoed and reverbed echoes, organic instruments… it’s basically top-notch psydub, down to the p, s and y, as much as the s, c and i. It’s what makes great Merkaba Music and Shanti Planti releases. Bar the last track, the other four have a great ethnic feel to them so here is the playlist to hear the whole thing in its entirety; it’s a lot more charming like that:

Bogtrotter – Parallel Universe (Bumble Remix)

As named in the title, this is some super hyperbolic beatwork here; the groove barely makes sense but it does. The whole situation is a big paradoxical celestial polyrhythmic mess that can’t be explained scientifically, but makes total sense even to the deafest of ears. It’s the sort of thing that can induce sober trips and it’s the sort of thing that happens when two psydub dons merge on a quantum level of production.

 

Halfred – Deep Blue

Halfred’s moved to that league of producers who you know everything he puts out now is gonna be unique and worth checking out. Even the thought of a new Halfred release is illusively alluring to me these days. With Deep Blue, he delves into some crazy ethnic aquatic deep dubstep vibe with many half time, double time and triplet sub-rhythms creating an overall intrinsic, groovy and tasteful soundscape.. oh and its apparently only a WIP so far.

 

Centre of the Universe – Black Feta

An offering from the Generation Bass dudes, Centre of the Universe creates an EP which has the world flavour on lock and mixes it with a unique 8-bit flavour for extra character. This song from the EP captures an incredible Oriental Dub feel that we had to include on this blog. Sound-design-wise, this is not 2016 craziness, but it uses every trick in the book that was classically appealing and offers it in a perfectly composed package. The soaring n bending lead synth licks are perfect for anyone looking for that Near Eastern twirl.

Ghana Sound System – Uzuntu

Mystical digital skankers, Ghana Sound System are back with another score; another one hitting the ethnic dub sound right on the head, topped with what sounds like Byzantine scales. Apparently, Üzüntü means sadness in Turkish and this is certainly echoed in what this tune sounds like. While nothing out of the extra-ordinary, these 2008ish wubs, super-old school 8-bit melodies and drum machines go hand-in-hand to aid the Turkish wails of sorrow and create this piece.

Ethnic Mid-Tempo

SOOHAN – Global Gate 808

I was extremely stoked even when I saw the name of this album which basically exactly and perfectly does what it is said on the tin. It brings you songs from all over – Greece, India, Arabia, Balkans, Ethiopia – adding that 808 dancefloor banger flavour to it. Needless to say, I immediately downloaded it and bust the remix of Kaur’s Anmol Gagan Maan at a Holi show in Nepal. Needless to say shittttt went wild. Other favourites from the album are the redos of Oratnitza’s Trap, Mome! and Elli Kokkinou’s Ki Allo. Basically this whole album is something you need in your artillery if you mix this style live; it could totally save your set at a low point.

Ill.Gates – More Tea (+Remixes)

Ill.Gates comes out with this single which is basically about…. TEA! Lots of it. So much that he had to get remixes from a ridiculous feet of producers; Mr.Bill, Liquid Stranger, David Starfire, Sonia Calico & Jason Hou. They all add their own signature touch to the song with Liquid Stranger and Starfire adding even more heavy wobbly dubs to it, Mr Bill pretty much making an almost unrecognizable new Billified Bristol garage version, and Sonia Calico and Jason Hou making super-epic trappy Do Hits-esque versions of it. Difficult to pick favourites but Jason Hou’s version most gracefully keeps the charm of the original while creating something wholly novel; another reason why Do Hits is one of the best doing Ethnofusion at this minute in time. Big props to Muti Music for dropping this super-creative collection.

Govinda – Beautiful Misery & Dervish ft. Nizami

Last month, we blogged the first pre-release offering from Govinda’s latest project and it definitely indicated that this album will be to be fucked with. Now with all the tracks out, I gave a listen to them all and these two songs deliver on that same level of emotional intricacy that Illuminatum did. They both come with the richness that I often see missing in many psydub releases of recent. It’s the perfect balance of atmospherics, squelchy psyentificm and beautiful hypnotic instruments. These songs are certainly an ode to Govinda’s longevity in this scene of music and beyond. Here is the playlist for the whole release for good measure:

 

Mettakin – Iroko

Our own Mettakin comes out with this super-tribal mid-tempo tune this month which captures a little bit of everything Mettakin. It’s glitched out, it has the reggae skank in the background, granualized effects here n there, lots of strange rhythms, chants, and more. It’s definitely one of his best in the less-glitched out and more melodic part of his resume and one for anyone with interests in roots, bass, glitch and ethnic music.

Bandish Projekt – Chunar Remix

Bandish Projekt prove again that their take of classic Bollywood and Hindi songs manages to bring the craziest neuro style bass and drum design to the table, creating something wholly novel. Liquid Indian Neurostep might be the best way to describe this perfect tune that will sit somewhere between the slow and heavy section of your sets.

Subleeminal – Sunday to India / Soleil Levant / Sitar Exploration

I discovered Subleeminal recently through our Ethnofusion group on SC and utilizing a mixture of Kontact Native Instruments, Ableton, Logic Pro and a bunch of other stuff, he crafts super-authentic world beats. The beats tend to be very instrumental, no crazy bass designs, no banger club vibes, but somewhere down the Buddha Bar, meditative electronica side of the spectrum. It’s really hard to doubt the quality. The tunes stretch out from the Near East towards India and they are perfect for anyone looking for things to remix. Here are three uploads from him this month, they all make for very pleasurable listening:

 

Ethnic Trap

Kuro – 一 人で

Kuro is quickly becoming one of my favourite artists in general, and in terms of all things ethnic and trappy in specific. Every month he’s coming out with a tune this good that puts a lot of tracks in this post-trappy heavy bass dreamwave style to shame. He’s recently been featured on the Zen Supremacy ‘Friends’ compilation and mark these words; with this pace, he is definitely one of those producers that will blow up in Soda Island magnitudes in 2016.

Bohan Phoenix – LOVELOVEWORLDWIDE来回来去 (prod. HOWIE LEE)

The Do Hits boys hit hard again this month with their unique blend of English/Mandarin rap, Chinese trap and innovative beatwork, courtesy of Howie Lee. The whole package is well done, the rap fits the song and all the sounds used in the beat really further solidify the Do Hits’ authentic grasp on the Asian spectrum of trap music.

Race Bannon – Sweet & Sour

I’ve heard some stuff from Ouroboros Records before and all the time, I’d hope it sounds something like this one from Race Bannon that they released this month. It’s essentially banger dancefloor trap but the oriental feel is real. The haunting classical-esque vocals dual with some ethnic plucking action, creating a truly epic soundscape. Apocalyptic rave on lock right here.

ASADI – Persian Queen

I came across ASADI recently and he is a young producer who specifically produces Persian Trap, often so far using sounds from well-known Iranian songs such as Googoosh’s Man o To in this pick and hooks from Shahram Nazeri in other songs. Googoosh’s catchy compositions and unique voice got a pretty banging redo on this tune and have no doubt that this version of the classic will have any wine-ridden Persian in your crowd to bust all their traditional dance moves that they learnt from their uncles at 2 years old.

CVRELESS – Yalla Than Rima [Evil EP]

A mildly evil minimal 808-ridden desert trap tune right here, not to be heard listening to on your headphones in an airport if you wear a hipster beard (for obvious reasons). It’s super bassy and there’s basically reverb everywhere; it’s basically the ambiance of a cave where you might end up tying the knot with a goddess ghost.

DELAY. – Hanzo (feat. don’t)

Slow-trap echofella records martyrcore god-given Ouija-swag genie-in-the-smithnwesson sheikhoeight kinda thing, if you will, or if that makes any sense… pretty sure it gets the message across.

SOUNDZ H!IGH – Magic

TRAP. DEEP. Basically minimal wailoeight. Nothing revolutionary here but it’s perfectly acceptable Hindi trap to get mystical to.

Ethnic Uptempo

All Done – Alone in the Desert (Ethnic House)

I got this track sent in for consideration and despite there were some things I didn’t like about the mix and master, I thought the composition did the job well enough to present it here. Newcomer producer, All Done took the Oud from Nasser Shamma’s Luz Del Alma and the Darbuka from Mısırlı Ahmet’s Çölde Tek Başına to make his driving house-ish desertronic score. Overall, it has really nice vibe and good use has been made from the samples. With some added spice and perhaps inclusion of recorded instruments, All Done can become another staple name on this blog.

Mosillator – Makah

Anyone care for fast paced ethnic drum n bass? Mosillator’s almost chip tunization of a female voice, atop this intrinsic drum n bass barrage works really well. This is definitely something to smash into a late uptempo set to bring the energy levels down yet keep the pump level at maximum.

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