Merck Fragments

Got some good news to share with you all. Proem’s new ambient album will be hitting stores in 2 weeks, May 15th. In keeping with the times, hes been nice enough to put the entire thing on Last.fm for you all to enjoy. Head on over to his blog to check out a link (amongst other good proeminess). Here. I haven’t even had time to check it out myself yet, but we all know how the Proem rolls… so Enjoy!.

-G

PS. on an unrelated note, a brief explanation for the site slogan “The doorbell rings first at my house”. Its something that a good friend of mine wrote in a sketch book next to his graf piece in one of our many drunken late night black book and music listening sessions back in the 90′s. At the time we thought it was quite hilarious and genius, it of course doesn’t make much sense to anyone else. But that’s the way I like it… and I guess it somehow hints at the idea that I feel like I’m always into shit early. Either way, its an inside joke, but those are the best kind. :)

So back in 1995 I started hearing what I would later find out was ‘atmospheric drum & bass’, on the one decent radio show we had down here (Underground Show, Friday nights on WVUM). At the time I couldn’t tell the difference between Carl Cox and Photek, but within a few weeks I started to catch on and it culminated with the purchase of Logical Progression, and soon after any other LTJ associated stuff I could find. Eventually I started to delve more into the harder and darker side of atmospheric stuff with Photek and the like. Then on a roadtrip in 1998 I was fortunate enough to stumble upon No U-Turn’s Torque (2xcd). Now quite frankly I don’t want to compare the two head to head, but Torque and Logical Progression are easily the most influential DnB cds ever. Torque blew me the fuck away, it was drum n bass meets my metal tendencies of pre-electronica days. The 2nd CD Ed Rush mix is easily one of the greatest DnB mixes ever. This cd showed me a whole different side of DnB that wasn’t jazzy, cheesy, or loungey. Instead it was forbodaing, in your face, dark, and grimey. From then on I gravitated more and more towards the dark and heavy stuff. Eventually moving into the heaviest shit at the time, stuff like Panacea, Twisted Anger, and my favorite DnB artist of all time Dom & Roland. I shunned most of the new jump-up and more pop sounding DnB crap that was coming out, even going so far as being quoted in a 200something issue of Xlr8r as saying “Dom & Roland is the only one doing anything interesting in DnB anymore.” or something like that.

Flash forward a few years, spring 2007, my good friend Rob/Multilink sends me a link to a mix by Marcus Intalex (runs the label Soul:r) from his Red Bull Music Academy radio show called Soulution radio. I loved it. It captured that early atmospheric sound, contemporized it, and even included nods and elements from the darker and harder stuff that I couldn’t get away from. Since then I’ve tracked down all the radio shows, and for the most part they are my favorite thing I’ve heard in the genre in years. Not all of them are slam dunks, but the quality control is top notch, not overtly promotional. He just plays shit he likes, if its on his label, so be it, if not then he mans up to say he wishes it was (reminds me of myself). He does a get bit chatty on the mic sometimes, but its generally more quaint than annoying. So, you can either check out the stream versions of the mixes over at www.rbmaradio.com, but their site is kinda trapped in 2003, so I recommend you grab the pirated mp3 grabs of them over at breaksblog.biz. Either way if you’re into contemporary DnB at all, and had any appreciation for the early 90′s stuff, you should definitely check these things out. Some highlights include: Dec. 05 & June/July 06 versions (pre-RBMA status), Vol. 3 (Clarendon into Rufige Kru, so perfect), the guest mix from Seba in Volume 4 (amazingly dark and awesome for someone I previously thought was weak), Volume 6 (first one I heard), Volume 9 (good variety of stuff), Volume 11 (lots of good new stuff). p.s. haven’t felt the last two shows that much, but deff grab Vol. 11.

Enjoy Massif!

So the mess that was Normrex has finally been resolved and put on the right track. So I’m proud to say Travis’s first album in years, “Want to 1 2″, will finally be coming out on April 12th. In the meantime hes released a single promoting the album, and also appears numerous times on production on the new Theophilus London album “This Charming Man” (Also has production by Jimmy Edgar on it too).

Here is a little promo video spot.

You can hear/buy the single on Itunes here.

You can hear/buy the T. London album on Itunes here.

And I have a tasty little treat for you courtesy of Travis and I (for those of you who haven’t pirated the advance version), here is my favorite track (and the closing track) on the Want to 1 2 album. Enjoy!

-G

(Oh, this isn’t an april fools joke either, seriously, click the links)

Happy new year to everyone. We got a new look on the page… just wanted to change it up for the new year, it needs some tweaking though, but I got a new captcha going to save you guys trouble as well.

So… to start off the year I wanted to let you in that Proswell will be releasing a remix album on his Inpuj net label in the next few months. WIth all the usual players (ilkae, arctic hospital, khonnor, sabi,…) and then some new names as well. He also just released a Christmas album of sorts on there, and if you haven’t been on his site in a while he released a massive album earlier last year called Cyclothymia. They all can be had over on the main page at Inpuj.net.

Free.

Enjoy!

Here are 2 Machinedrum remixes you may have missed from this summer, courtesy of the Palm Out Sounds blog. The Johnny Cash track is one of my favorite tracks of the year, classic Travis.

Johnny Cash – “Belshazzar” (Machine Drum Remix)

Praveen & Benoit – “Embers” (Machinedrum Version)

Enjoy!

So I dug up 3 more DJ Aura mixes for you all, including the Warp Radio one. Its pretty solid… though a bit slow (see: downtempo) for the majority of the start of the mix.

DJ Aura – Warp Radio Mix
DJ Aura – Procmix 2001
DJ Aura – IDM Mix 2002

Also found a mix he did with 3 other local DJ’s (some awesome guys to see live): Polaris, Karakter, and Bobby D. Polaris goes first, Karakters set begins on: Jeswa – Skone, Bobby D’s set begins on: Autechre – Eutow, and Aura’s set begins on: Squarepusher – WAP155.

Dj Polaris, Karakter, Bobby D, Aura – Los Four Amigos Mix

Aura, Travis, Otto, Dino

Its only right that I end this slew of links to Miami Friend DJ’s sets with none other than DJ Aura. All of the previous guys have been very influential to me, theres nothing better to listen to than a good DJ mix, and I’ve discovered many tracks I love through other peoples mixes. I’ll just say off the bat that Dj Aura AKA Robert Freitag is the best IDM DJ in the world, and my favorite DJ I’ve ever had the privilege to see spin live. I unfortunately have very few mixes of his on tape, but I do have a very early one he did in 1996 promoting a show down here (see the flyer here), that I’d like to share with you all. Its a bit dated, and its taped off the radio, but you get the idea that 2 years later, from 1998-2000, I was lucky enough to be able to watch him spin once a week on 3 turntables and a $10,000 sound system. Needless to say he has probably had the most influence on me musically out of anybody involved in the scene here in Miami, though Romulo (Phoenicia, Schematic) did sell me my first Autechre cd, and Seven (Chocolate Industries) still owes me a copy of Lego Feet, Robert really put a ton of music into my ears that I would never have heard if I didn’t make the effort to go hear him play every week.

DJ Aura – 1996 WVUM Mix Part 1
DJ Aura – 1996 WVUM Mix Part 2

Here are some electro mixes by my awesome friend Chris / DJ a05 / DJ MTA aka Mass Transit Records. He now lives in Shanghai, China as a 5 star chef and food reviewer (seriously), but he still manages to DJ over there. I’m trying to get over there to checkout whatever hes spinning at the moment, cause it will be big in a few years.

I met him on the IDM list in 1998, started hanging out with him soon after at our local weekly, Beatcamp (listening to DJ Aura, who will be mentioned in my next post). He started spinning electro and really took it to heart, finding and collecting some of the best and rarest stuff, and making cassette mixes for me that I would play constantly. Here are a few of them ripped from the cassettes, most of them done 1999-2001.

He started a small electro label in 2000 around the same time as Merck, and released some good underground stuff. Kept it going for a few years until he stopped in 2003. Of course about a week after he quit his label, and stopped DJing electro all together, Electroclash blew up huge and was leaking from every orifice of the music industry. But he was already on to the next thing.

DJ a05 – Dark Electro Mix 1999
One of my favorite mixes of his, tons of Rother and Finlow….. thats all a good electro mix really needs.

DJ a05 – Electro Mix
Starts off IDMey, then goes down into deep electro.

DJ a05 – IDM-Electro Mix 2000
Another one that starts off IDMey, then goes down into deep electro. Has a few lock grooves on it, and a great mix of DJ Assault and While.

DJ a05 – Live on WVUM Part 1
DJ a05 – Live on WVUM Part 2
A variety of electro and IDM stuff, heavy on the Richie Devine. Recorded live of him DJing on the University of Miami radio station in 2000, promoting one of the original Infiltrate shows.

DJ MTA – Music For Fashionable People
Heres the final mix of electro I have from him, aptly entitled Music for Fashionable People, as he saw the trend that was emerging at the time.

Enjoy!

As promised here are some more mixes from the excellent DJ Alex Sins. Local Merck DJ, music fan, and partner in crime. These mixes are older, but hey, thats when a lot of good music came out. :) He has some of the best selection in electro tracks that I’ve ever heard.

DJ Alex Sins – Detached Electro Mix

DJ Alex Sins – Fraktionz IDM Mix

DJ Alex Sins – Womb Electro Mix

DJ Alex Sins – Womb IDM Mix

He also did a lovely mix of a variety of styles for Percussionlab, which you can download here: DJ Alex Sins – Percussionlab Mix. He also had posted about it recently on his blog, which is always a good read.

Enjoy!

Here are the two mixes that used to be available on the Artist page on m3rck.net. Both from 2002, so they sound rather dated (and limited in catalog usage), but you asked for it, so here they are. But I don’t recommend these for anyone who is not nostalgic about the IDM sound from earlier in the decade. :)

Also gonna throw in another mix from 2002 by DJ Synertia of IDM stuff, has some Merck material in it, and sounds pretty dated too. :) I’ll have to do a separate post in the future of some more mixes from Alex Sins as hes got superb selection as a DJ (and actual skills at beatmatching, unlike me).

DJ Alex Sins – Merck Mix 2002

DJ Synertia – Merck Mix 2002

DJ Synertia – IDM Mix 2002