I went to see Aphex twice in the same week

Electronic Music legend Richard D. James aka Aphex twin played his first London club show in ten years last 14th September, followed by a self-curated night in Manchester’s The Warehouse Project. I went to both and got to be part of the devoted crowd who had been brought together by the father of the rave in a much awaited-for UK show (or shows in my case)

I grew up in Madrid where everyone surrounding me listened mainly to the top 40 charts and Reggaeton. Rock was my genre of preference and my most-played artists were Pink Floyd, Joy Division and The Rolling Stones. I stumbled upon Boards of Canada thanks to YouTube and it lead me to a complete unheard-of world of electronic. My admiration for ambient and everything Aphex related started when I first heard Windowlicker, one of his singles released in 1999 with a video unlike anything I’d seen before. I felt so drawn to this sound. It was something so new. Something so different. I probably spent the next couple of weeks going deep into his music on YouTube and Soundcloud and was so grateful to see the innumerable tracks out there waiting for me to listen.

It’s an understatement to say how much I desired to see Richard live. He introduced me to the world of ambient and electronic, which is a huge part of my life now.

The mysterious aura that follows Aphex only made it more exciting to see the possibility of me getting to be part of one of those crowds I had seen in videos of his sets so many times before.

Hearing about his upcoming performance in London’s Printworks felt like destiny. I didn’t think twice about getting the ticket. This East London venue opened two years ago and has managed to position itself as a mecca for electronic music with line-ups filled by the most important names out there. The aesthetic look of Printworks, with high industrial ceilings and a huge space for dancing, presented to be the perfect venue for Aphex’s performances, that have such a strong visual element to them.

The London show was supported by the Italian artist Caterina Barbieri, Ugandan percussion group Nihiloxica, and Manchester producer and DJ Afrodeutsche, which were all outstanding. There was incomparable positive energy and excitement amongst all of us present that went on growing along with the incredible light show presented by his regular collaborator Weirdcore.

The set allowed the crowd to dance crazily or nod in a ‘cool’ sign of approval with a non-stopping grinning between all of us present. We were all aware of the custom of strong lighting and spectacular shows that characterize Aphex but we were all in awe to experience the manic depictions of himself and images of the people in the crowd manipulated digitally. It was definitely one in a lifetime experience.

As I feared the possibility of missing out on the London show, I also purchased tickets for his soon after the announced show in the Depot in Manchester. This lineup comes with a longer list of acts by new electronic artists and the Russian techno queen Nina Kraviz.

The opening party of the new Warehouse Project venue in Mayfield curated by Aphex came along with performances that proved worthy of the inauguration party bringing combined sounds and featuring performances from Aleksi Perala, Lee Gamble and Shanghai’s 33EMYBW, amongst others. The crowd was ready to see their idol after Aleksi Perala finished his hour set. Finally, Richard came on stage with his wife and took around 20 minutes to set everything up. The waiting felt like an eternity for many of us dying to get lost in our idol’s set.

This 10000-capacity venue played a defining role in the event boasting three spacious and industrial-like rooms, different bars and outstanding speakers.

When the first set of visuals and sounds came through, it can be felt how all of us just got a weight off and could enjoy what will be one of the best electronic performances witnessed in this year. The masterful mixing, the unexpected tracks but also some of Aphex’s very own, like Polynomial-C towards an hour into the set, made it all an unforgettable experience that left us gasping for more and confirmed him as the Father of the ambient and electronic scene.

A look into the crowd confirms the influence that Aphex’s music carries on having nowadays. Ranging from late 50 years-old to barely 18, WHP’s opening night was full of passionate people awaiting to ecstatically see, the demi-God producer. The end of the set was over too soon but it really lived up to the high expectations of Aphex’s devoted fanbase.

Electronic scene in Latin America

feature for Threads Radio on the origins and development of the actual electronic scene in Latin America

https://threadsradio.com/fusion-bastarda-the-electronic-music-scene-in-latin-america/?fbclid=IwAR2j6m9LfKQYY32-1v7Ol8GuLGoYPP5SbpUVZdDkNPC3Y_fHQRRwj74vMRs

After the fire that took 200 lives during a gig in República Cromañón, a club in Buenos Aires, the city’s nightlife experienced a vast decline. The government shut down several venues, leaving party-goers devastated and launching them into a quest for safe spaces to express their love for music.

From the ashes of República Cromañón, a new scene arose when the underground parties called ‘Zizek’ commenced in the Argentinian capital hoping to revive the nightlife. These parties were known for offering all different genres of music in the same night, from electronic to traditional Latin American cumbia, which provided a new platform for experimentation and freedom. These parties were the crucible for the new genre “digital cumbia”, which was characterised by mixing the Colombian genre in a modern setting through technology.

The organisers of the ‘Zizek’ parties realised this new wave that was taking form in their events and decided to give them a platform, creating the label ‘ZZK’. Amid this developing electronic movement, artists like Chancha via Circuito and Nicolá Cruz started to mark a trend that changed the way that electronic music is produced in Latin America.

‘ZZK’ and what was first described as ‘digital cumbia’ broke barriers and started a movement that can only be described as eclectic and fails to adhere to any subcategorization, probably the reason why western media has talked so little about it. Artists by the likes of Nicolá Cruz, Lagartijeando, Chancha via Circuito and El Búho are offering a new musical language through experimentation that has an understanding of the local indigenous and afro-cosmologies and work with soothing organic sounds that sonically recreate the beautiful South American landscapes without leaving the dancefloor.

Shaman chants and charango (a small Andean guitar that was traditionally made from an armadillo shell) are the defining sounds and the foundation of Matias Zundel’s music. In a quest for his identity and hoping to grow musically, Matias moved from his smaller village in Argentina to the capital, where he studied Sound Engineering. Matias then started mixing electronic with cumbia, rock and hip hop and, after moving to Mexico, his project ‘Lagartijeando’ was born.

“I wanted to work more with identity, you know? I wanted to give a light on the identity of our culture and how to work with music from here (South America)”, he says when talking about Lagartijeando.

He explains how his project has been in continuous evolution. He started out mixing cumbia and electronic influenced by genres like dance, hall or hip hop. During his early experimental phase, he started to realise that his beginnings were, as he described jokingly, “bastard of all genres”. Matias’ tracks would produce bpm’s too different. “I could be producing from 70 to 150 in all that spread of bpms, you know? It was really fun because I wasn’t thinking of playing it live or in anything at all. But when the moment came to present it live, a dilemma raised. It had too many intensities, too many energies to it, playing a lot of rhythms with different timings felt like too much information and I also felt that it worked best in the dancefloor to keep the same rhythm. You question yourself about your premises and about what are you looking for in a good live show.”

Matias then started producing something more constant, that had the decadence and trance of European electronic music, as he described. He believes that what he is producing now is something he feels more identified with and that people coming from electronic can perfectly understand:” maybe that’s the hook of it, like the new language that’s being generated in a way respects the decadence of trance, of entering a trance and remaining on that flow that maintains that hypnosis but being more eclectic and experimenting with cultures. In my sets, I like to go through different ways, to different situations. I love to surprise the audience and present different landscapes and flavours.”

Matias reiterates the importance of being different and not settling on a formula since he is already seeing a scene and a new set language being developed. “It can be dangerous because what I’ve noticed is that a lot of artists and tracks have started to sound the same and to feel repeated, you see? this is artistically speaking, quite dangerous.”

Pedro Canale (aka Chancha via Circuito) is one of the South American producers that has been able to spread his understanding of electronic music more significantly than his contemporaries and was an undeniable source of inspiration by the generation of artists to follow. Canale, in an email exchange, wrote about his journey with excitement and praised the fact that western media is paying more attention to what is forming musically in South America but attributes the lack of coverage from London to a massive array of genres and subcultures that make it hard to really cover a particular scene different from the mainstream.

There’s a tendency to define and set structures into music genres that has made out of the music being developed in Latin America to be categorised into “digital cumbia”, “electrocumbia”, … Pedro says, “Let them call it whatever they want, sometimes it’s easier to refer to it as electrofolk and be done with it but in reality, we know that all of this surpasses those limits”.

When something tends to work musically, there is always the fear of repetition and lack of innovation but Pedro thinks that there are still a lot of artists who break with what is been established and they continue to make it better like Mateo Kingman or Baiuca.

“There’s still a long way to go,” continues Pedro, “there is still a lot to experiment with and discover. We just have to abandoned the idea that everything we do has to work on the dancefloor.” The only thing that this movement has in common is the need of experimenting and the desire of pushing limits. What it’s being explored in Latin America doesn’t fall into a specific formula and continues to reinvent itself with what the artists producing it are feeling.

Clubbers outside of South America are feeling more attracted to this tribal kind of music that evokes the nature of its land and has often been labelled as “organic electronic” wave. The journey really is captured in the sets of the artists by the likes of Chancha via Circuito, Lagartijeando and El Búho.

Robin Perkins (alias El Búho which translates to “The owl”) grew up in a cold little town of Northern England but found his musical home in Latin America. Robin started to produce a mix of techno and dubstep but admits that this was never the sound that fully defined him.

When Robin moved to Argentina and started attending some of the ‘Zizek’ parties, he felt as if the world was opening up ahead of him after seeing artists like Chancha via Circuito play.

“From there, I started trying new things, to mix Latin sounds and something I really liked and it defined better my identity. I was fascinated.”, he describes.

He then commenced a journey around South America where he discovered a vast range of music. Robin felt that the landscapes and folklore of places like Peru, where he stayed for 3 months, inspired him to start producing his music.

“When you start looking for the roots and traditions of any country you discover a vast richness in them, not only in South America. We want to explore how to get out of the norm with electronic. This is a ‘no barrier’ movement.

This English born owl found his sound and started producing with ZZK records, together with Nicolá and Lagartijeando. He now feels his identity to be as Latin as it is English and keeps producing evoking tracks with artists who explore similar routes.

This movement, although having started to form back in 2006 with Zizek, feels like it’s only just beginning since it continues to explore new sounds offering a journey in each of the sets of the genre. With growing popularity in Europe, El Búho and Lagartijeando continue to tour and release mixes and they will both be sharing their understanding of contemporary electronic with the world.

Matias Zundel feels optimistic about what he and other artists are doing: “This movement has the capacity of nurturing from music from all over the world. It’s really diverse and it will continue to grow, it’s only the beginning”.

Robin seemed to agree, “What happens next? We are in a really interesting wave but we must continue and evolve. As a musician, you need to be pushing yourself to new things and to develop within the same vision but with different stuff. I believe that the future is going to be good to us.”

A Guy Called Gerald (Interview for Threads)

Interview for Threads with A Guy Called Gerald.

Can be found at https://threadsradio.com/interview-a-guy-called-gerald-things-disappear/

House music can’t be understood in the UK without mentioning the legendary Gerald Simpson, more famously known as A Guy Called Gerald. On Thursday 22nd of August, a few days before his second time playing at our lovely home The Cause, Gerald appeared on Threads Radio’s THINGS DISAPPEAR show about his upbringing, the music scene in Manchester and globally in the 80s, and how he sees the present electronic music scene.

Hailing from Manchester, Gerald grew up with a fusion of music, but where jazz and soul were predominant. In Gerald’s household, music took on an important role. His passion for it could be felt in the air while he explained to Threads how there was an atmosphere of constant music when he was growing up.

Gerald’s family’s Jamaican roots had an influence on his musical journey, as well as funk, soul, and reggae: “We didn’t have anything else. This became like our escape. I don’t know what I was escaping from but music talked to me. It just grabbed me,” Gerald says. Electronic music was something to dance to, not something to listen to or follow up on the charts for producer. Seeking this danceable music was a goal for him ever since he and his friends discovered electro-funk.

Gerald’s journey into music production was an unusual one. He attended a referral school and was asked to choose between sports or a creative pursuit. He chose contemporary & jazz dance, but he felt grabbed by the necessity of replicating the sounds of what had been astonishing him. “The reason I first got a drum machine is actually because in a dance class, we used to have a drummer at the front. When we were doing the warmup exercise, they used to change tempo. The first time I kind of looked at a drum machine, I was like ‘Oh wow, I could do that home’”, he explained.

Miles Davis was the catalyst for the Manchester-born artist. He admits being blown away by the realisation that music could tell a story in such a way. This led to further exploration of constructing narratives through music and his analysis of complex interplay between instruments and composition which lead Gerald to further becoming immersed in music production. At the time, the Manchester scene’s record stores would get hold of the latest productions from Chicago and Detroit straight away. Gerald, inspired by the likes of artists like Derrick May and Juan Atkins began paving his way to becoming an icon in House.

Manchester in the 80s was known mainly for pop, rock and metal. Dance music was still something generally unheard of till the burgeoning rave scene characterised by places such as legendary The Haçienda. Gerald somehow managed to veer off this track and ended up always seeking more experimental stuff that he would find in his innumerable record and music store trips.

In a sort of DIY way, Gerald started to play around with his basic equipment and began making his own tracks: “I thought to myself, I just need like a cheap synthesizer and the drum machine and I can build my own tracks, you know, cause I was listening to all these other like electro funk tracks by then and I thought that I could build something like that.”

All the US imports would make their way into Gerald’s hands. “I was just like scooping all that stuff up. As soon as anything that was electronic came, I wanted it, you know, I wanted to know how it was made, how it was,” he says. He would find inspiration from all this techno and acid house coming and started sampling different sounds on putting them over his drum machine.

“That’s how I get inspiration, I’ll be listening to things that triggered me. So I would get triggered by these tracks that had to just blow me away and that was what Detroit was for me”, Gerald explained. With all of this exploration and production, Gerald helped to shape the country’s dance music identity. Anthems such as Voodoo Ray meant a new language that would start to be spoken in a vast line of productions from then. Gerald continued to bring revolutionary trends starting to produce later on jungle and DnB tracks, with his 1995 album ‘Black Secret Technology’ considered one of the finest jungle records ever.

When asked about the current electronic scene, Gerald says that it has become more focused on monetisation and completely losing the essence of this genre’s roots. “I came from a time when there was more excitement than finance involved in the music,” he says. “Nowadays you can’t really build like a trend or recall or any of these things anymore cause as soon as something becomes what they call viral, it’s over. As soon as you have your little niche or your little thing and you want to put it out there, everybody wants to monetize it and that thing just dissolves into something global.”

Gerald wishes to hear people creating new formulas, because for him this music was always about independence and freedom. Now (for him) it appears like everything created musically now is out of a booklet and that people are afraid to step out of the box and bring forth new sounds, directions and ideas. “It seems like now people are being pushed to do a certain style or this delusion that you need to be on the Boiler Room to get there,” he says laughing. “I want to hear everyone’s own fingerprint. I want to hear everyone being an individual. I want to hear everyone sounding like themselves.”

Apart from this first feeling of distance towards today’s scene, Gerald also finds himself hopeful of all the changes that technology has had in music. “That was my dream, you know, to be able to create a story from things I could just pull out of the air, I mean available in this technology where if I wanted to do a hardcore jungle mix of anything I can just go on YouTube and find anything I can use,” says Gerald.

The last Tribes party at The Cause was Gerald’s second time playing at this shortly to be closed musical oasis in North London and his wonderful selection confirmed him as one of the greatest names in the UK House scene. Gerald affirmed that he will still be making music for himself and left the show on an encouraging note for all the aspiring producers out there: “You do have global control over what you’ve created if you want it, I mean, all the information is there online. So you could have your own publishing, you could do your own broadcast, you could do everything yourself. And like this for me, this is the future.”